AFCO Systems announced today that AFCO Systems Development (ASD), the company's software engineering group, was awarded three individual embedded systems development contracts from the Federal Government totaling $3 million. The contracts were awarded for development of stronger cyber security systems for government computers.

The first contract was awarded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the central research and development organization for the United States Department of Defense, with the second contract being awarded by the Department of Homeland Security, and the third by the Office of the Secretary of Defense through the United States Air Force (USAF).

Designed to protect a host computer from harmful malware attacks, the first two contracts concern providing hardware-assisted cyber security. In order to protect national software and data assets, the second contract expands on this fundamental functionality.

Porting a capability-based secure operating system, Coyotos, to an embedded platform, is involded by the third contract. A fortified computing environment which, unlike traditional operating systems, maintains a tighter control over system interactions, is provided by a "capability-based operating system". It is envisioned that through the use of Coyotos, future embedded platforms will be "hardened".

The ASD development team includes a trusted computing platform expert, Dr. Sean Smith, an operating system and processor design expert, Dr. Jonathan Shapiro and a world-renowned malware expert, Greg Hoglund.

AFCO Systems Development has provided embedded systems for medical, government and industry. ASD is, for the medical industry, the design and manufacturing agent for a major MRI manufacturer. Additionally, it provides hardware analysis and firmware development support to a surgical instrument manufacturer that builds radiofrequency (RF) knives, which use electromagnetic energy to make incisions.