CRII: SaTC: Securing Smart Devices with AI-Powered mmWave Radar in New-Generation Wireless Networks

Future networking systems, such as 6G cellular and future Wi-Fi networks, are envisioned to connect billions of heterogeneous smart devices and enable high-speed and low-latency communications using millimeter wave (mmWave) technologies. Instead of focusing on using mmWave for data communication, this project outlines a challenging research plan on exploring, implementing, and evaluating novel mmWave-based sensing techniques for cyber security applications. The project’s novelties are the development of mmWave-based biometrics to defend against more advanced attacks and to respond faster to potential data breaches. The project's broader significance and importance are that the research will help us to gain a fundamental understanding on adopting the mmWave-based sensing techniques for potential security applications. A successful outcome of the research will lead to new biometrics techniques that can provide stronger access control for device and data protection. The project consists of three parts. The first part is to develop mmLock, a user-leaving detection system by analyzing the mmWave signal reflections from the user body. It can help lock device automatically to prevent data theft when the user is unknowingly away from his/her device. The research will explore and address the challenging scenario of having multiple moving objects simultaneously. The second part investigates a liveliness detection technique by checking the consistency between the user’s head movement pattern extracted from vision analysis and the pattern from the corresponding mmWave data for more secure facial authentication. It has the potential to defend against the most advanced attacks such as 3D projection attack and can work in any lighting conditions. The third effort will implement a prototype system and evaluate its performance with regards to security and usability. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.