The future ATM system in Europe will rely heavily on the exchange of information between hosts of stakeholders. This shift in information exchange is facilitated through the SESAR’s system-wide information management (SWIM) technical infrastructure. However, greater connectivity has some specific security implications, which is why SESAR Joint Undertaking and its members are making this a key focus of their research and innovation activities.

SESAR is looking at security from several perspectives;

Security assessment and risks associated with SWIM implementation

One SESAR Project “SWIM security solutions” made an assessment of the security context and needs as well as the associated risks, applying SESAR’s security assessment methodology, aligned to National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO) best practices. This resulted in a list of security requirements for SWIM infrastructure, procedures and organisation. The project also performed an assessment of available security technologies for SWIM and identified security design solutions.

Identification of SWIM security requirements

In an iterative improvement cycle, the SESAR Project “Interface specifications and services technical requirements” performed a gap analysis between the security requirements stemming from the security assessment mentioned above and the SWIM technical specifications. Consequently, security solutions have been strengthened to take these additional requirements on board.

Cybersecurity

Finally, the SESAR JU recently published a cybersecurity study to support the introduction of a holistic approach to cybersecurity, and to complement the general ATM security approach already taken into account within the SESAR work programme. The results from the study will be applied to support the SESAR-2020 work programme. It also serves as input to a European wide cybersecurity strategy aimed at adequately managing information on cybersecurity aspects in the European ATM system.

Progress made to date on SWIM will be subject of the SESAR Global SWIM Demonstration event, which takes place on 8 and 9 June in Rome, Italy. The event aims to showcase the global interoperability capabilities of system-wide information management (SWIM) and in relation to the ICAO GANP/ASBU´s and the European ATM Master Plan.