Secure router and IoT gateway development for national cyber security using open-source security technology

The Challenge

Consumer and small-business networks are increasingly populated by insecure IoT devices that cannot defend themselves, and the national-scale consequence is a growing attack surface at the network edge. The NCSC needed practical evidence that the router / IoT gateway — the one point through which all local traffic flows — could be turned into an active defence point, and a codebase to prove it.

The Solution

IOTSecHub was a smart secure router / IoT gateway implementation project delivered for the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC). NQM designed and built the secure gateway platform, applying its secure data infrastructure expertise (device identity, controlled data flows and open, auditable software) to the problem of protecting whole networks from the router. Per the project’s Impact Report, the work ran over roughly 8 months, finishing pre-COVID with deliveries finalised in January 2020.

Outcomes

Outputs are largely captured in the open-source repository nqm-iot-sec-hub. Results were socialised across parts of NCSC and DCMS, including a presentation to Tom Rodden (then DCMS CSA). Most importantly, the project seeded both the ideas and the original codebase for a substantial portfolio of follow-on collaborative R&D — CyberStone/ManySecured, Secure Networking by Design (CHERI/Morello), ACOSA, EDGESec and the NIST trusted network onboarding work — making it the seed of NQM’s entire secure-networking product line.