Automating Modular Verification of Secure Information Flow

Pick, Lauren; Fedyukovich, Grigory; Gupta, Aarti

doi:10.34727/2020/isbn.978-3-85448-042-6_23

“…To do this we must efficiently combine subverifications for level components into a verification for the entire game. The idea of modular verification is well known in the formal methods literature [19], but it must be adapted to the distinct kind of modules relevant to level designers. It is not yet clear how to retrofit methods that combine proofs for local functions in software source code to combine proofs for local regions in a game world.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Softlock Detection for Super Metroid with Computation Tree Logic

Mawhorter

¹

,

Smith

²

2021

The 16th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games (FDG) 2021

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Videogame level designs can contain errors called softlocks where a player traversing the level in an unintended manner can become permanently stuck. In this paper, we explore the automated detection of softlocks in the game Super Metroid using Computation Tree Logic (CTL). Super Metroid distinguishes itself as an example domain because of its velocity-based movement and rich item upgrade hierarchy. These factors can cause softlocks in Super Metroid to be challenging to detect visually. We contribute a tile-based gameplay abstraction for Super Metroid, and demonstrate verification of CTL properties for scenarios based on a segment of the original game's level design. CTL can be used to define and test many other gameplay properties (e.g. which bosses can be skipped or which order items may be collected) and is immediately applicable to other game designs for which a compact abstraction of their state space can be enumerated. By making plausible design changes to a Super Metroid level fragment, we show how highly nonobvious softlocks can be detected and how the counterexamples resulting from verification failure can be turned into visualizations that explain the problem.

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“…Not only is induction a very interesting theoretical concept, it is also of high practical importance, since it is required to reason about software reliability, safety and security, see e.g. [13,7,10,22,11]. Such and similar software requirement typically involve properties over natural numbers, recursion, unbounded loop iterations, or recursive data structures like lists, and trees.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automating Induction by Reflection

Schoisswohl

¹

,

Kovács

²

2021

Electron. Proc. Theor. Comput. Sci.

1

0

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Despite recent advances in automating theorem proving in full first-order theories, inductive reasoning still poses a serious challenge to state-of-the-art theorem provers. The reason for that is that in first-order logic induction requires an infinite number of axioms, which is not a feasible input to a computer-aided theorem prover requiring a finite input. Mathematical practice is to specify these infinite sets of axioms as axiom schemes. Unfortunately these schematic definitions cannot be formalized in first-order logic, and therefore not supported as inputs for first-order theorem provers.In this work we introduce a new method, inspired by the field of axiomatic theories of truth, that allows to express schematic inductive definitions, in the standard syntax of multi-sorted first-order logic. Further we test the practical feasibility of the method with state-of-the-art theorem provers, comparing it to solvers' native techniques for handling induction.

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“…Not only is induction a very interesting theoretical concept, it is also of high practical importance, since it is required to reason about software reliability, safety and security, see e.g. [13,7,10,22,11]. Such and similar sofwtare requirememt typically involve properties over natural numbers, recursion, unbounded loop iterations, or recursive data structures like lists, and trees.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automating Induction by Reflection

Schoisswohl¹,

Kovács²

2021

Preprint

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite recent advances in automating theorem proving in full first-order theories, inductive reasoning still poses a serious challenge to state-of-the-art theorem provers. The reason for that is that in first-order logic induction requires an infinite number of axioms, which is not a feasible input to a computer-aided theorem prover requiring a finite input. Mathematical practice is to specify these infinite sets of axioms as axiom schemes. Unfortunately these schematic definitions cannot be formalized in first-order logic, and therefore not supported as inputs for first-order theorem provers.In this work we introduce a new method, inspired by the field of axiomatic theories of truth, that allows to express schematic inductive definitions, in the standard syntax of multi-sorted first-order logic. Further we test the practical feasibility of the method with state-of-the-art theorem provers, comparing it to solvers' native techniques for handling induction.This paper is an extended version of the LFMTP 21 submission with the same title.

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Automating Modular Verification of Secure Information Flow

Cited by 4 publications

References 51 publications

Softlock Detection for Super Metroid with Computation Tree Logic

Softlock Detection for Super Metroid with Computation Tree Logic

Automating Induction by Reflection

Automating Induction by Reflection

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