The Importance of Privacy for Virtual Prototyping: PRESS Analysis

With its bold mission to craft a resilient and secure digital simulation-driven ecosystem, CAELESTIS promises to unlock new frontiers of innovation and efficiency, ushering in an era of unparalleled progress for the aviation industry. At its core, CAELESTIS seeks to empower European aviation by enabling massive exploration of the design and manufacturing space. By harnessing the power of advanced technologies and integrating disparate elements of the engineering process, CAELESTIS aspires to revolutionize the way aircraft are designed, manufactured, and brought to life. This ambitious Horizon Europe project holds the potential to redefine the very essence of aerospace engineering, unleashing a wave of creativity and innovation that knows no bounds.

However, innovation cannot get in the way of several core values: privacy, ethics, cybersecurity, data protection. This is why a key output of CAELESTIS has to be an analysis focusing on privacy, data protection, ethics, cybersecurity & societal impacts – aka a PRESS Analysis. This article serves as an introduction to PRESS analysis and how CAELESTIS has performed on this topic – or you can go straight ahead download the entirety of CAELESTIS’ public deliverable on this topic right here from our website, put together by CAELESTIS’ expert partner in cybersecurity, eBOS.

The Essence of PRESS Analysis

At the heart of CAELESTIS lies the integration of PRESS analysis—a multifaceted approach encapsulating a myriad of answers to tough questions. PRESS analysis serves as a guiding compass, ensuring that every facet of the ecosystem aligns with ethical principles, legal requirements, and societal values. By meticulously evaluating predictive performance, assessing data protection measures, and addressing ethical implications, PRESS analysis empowers CAELESTIS to navigate the complex landscape of aerospace engineering with confidence and integrity.

“PRESS analysis, which stands for ‘Prediction Error Sum of Squares’ analysis, is a method used in statistics and machine learning to evaluate the predictive performance of a model. It is particularly common in the context of regression analysis.”

PRESS analysis plays a pivotal role in guiding decision-making and shaping the development of the digital simulation-driven ecosystem. From ensuring the privacy and security of sensitive data to addressing ethical concerns surrounding the use of advanced technologies, PRESS analysis serves as a cornerstone of integrity and accountability, and by incorporating it into its framework, CAELESTIS demonstrates its unwavering commitment to ethical excellence and responsible innovation.

Navigating CAELESTIS’ Ecosystem

By enabling extensive exploration of design and manufacturing realms, CAELESTIS aims to uncover new aerostructures and systems, driving a transformative shift. Central to this endeavor is the integration of various stakeholders with High-Performance Computing (HPC) systems, where intricate simulations take place.< During design phases, Distributed Engineering Teams (DET) collaborate with HPC environments, facilitating complex multiscale and multiphysics simulation workflows. These workflows yield rapid and precise predictive insights across diverse scenarios, encompassing mechanical performance, manufacturability, and uncertainty quantification. Leveraging massive simulations at HPC, CAELESTIS generates reduced order models, offering invaluable support as manufacturing decision tools, subsequently deployed to edge devices.

Throughout manufacturing, data flows from measurement tools to edge devices, fueling real-time predictions on shop floors. These predictions are crucial for detecting defects and assessing their impact on product or process performance. They inform decision support systems, enabling proactive measures to address non-conformance issues and implement corrective actions promptly.

The project is outlining the architecture of the CAELESTIS Interoperable Simulation Ecosystem (ISE), presenting a software solution for automating simulation workflows. This includes integrating various simulation software with data processing algorithms to analyze results and create reduced order models. Building upon previous tasks, the implementation details of key software components like the Hybrid Twin Platform (HTP) and HPC Simulation Service are provided. Additionally, mechanisms for integrating different simulation software and managing the digital thread are discussed.

PRESS Analysis: Outcomes

The PRESS analysis of cybersecurity threats, requirements, and recommendations pertinent to the proposed ecosystem is organized into sections. The document delineates the overall architecture of CAELESTIS ISE, mechanisms for managing simulation software interoperability, implementation details of key components, cybersecurity considerations, and the status of implementation with relevant links. The numerous simulations required by the ISE often demand different software tools and extensive computational resources, which can be time-consuming when performed on standard hardware. High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters offer acceleration for such computations, yet their integration and utilization require specialized scripts and tools, posing challenges for aircraft manufacturing engineers unfamiliar with these technologies.

The PRESS requirements, extensively outlined in the PRESS Requirements Checklistin the public deliverable, align with ENISA standards and ECSO recommendations. EBOS, CAELESTIS’s cybersecurity expert, conducted thorough desk research to gather pertinent information and brief project partners on the essential requirements The paramount goal is to secure CAELESTIS’s groundbreaking digital ecosystem while upholding the integrity of the European aircraft industry, safeguarding stakeholders’ privacy, and adhering to ethical principles.

The outlined requirements stemming from the PRESS analysis significantly influence the design of the CAELESTIS ISE architecture (see below). Most architecture components are deployed within CAELESTIS partners’ premises. IT managers must enforce system security measures, including firewalls, OS updates, and malware detection, to safeguard computing systems. Additionally, all service invocations and data transfers must adhere to secure protocols like HTTPS, SSH, or SFTP/SCP, ensuring encryption and incorporating Authorization, Authentication, and access control features. Secure communications involve the use of keys and tokens to automate invocations and data movements within workflows, with emphasis on secure key management and storage encryption. Moreover, the Storage Service and HPC file systems must integrate data protection measures to prevent data loss or damage.

Find out more by downloading the full public deliverable here.

Find out more about eBOS' work with CAELESTIS

eBOS Technologies is providing IT expertise to several key tasks throughout the lifecycle of CAELESTIS, with particular focus on the development of the HPC ecosystem (WP2). They will be leading the task concerning cybersecurity considerations to ensure the CAELESTIS system adopts appropriate mechanisms to safeguard the security of data, IP, and end-users.

Headquartered in Nicosia, Cyprus and founded in 2003, eBOS is an IT and innovation company, providing technologically advanced software solutions for business worldwide.