Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Metamorphic Testing for Cybersecurity

Published

Author(s)

Tsong Yueh Chen, Fei-Ching Kuo, Wenjuan Ma, Willy Susilo, Dave Towey, Jeff Voas, Zhi Q. Zhou

Abstract

Testing is a major approach for the detection of software defects, including security vulnerabilities. This article introduces metamorphic testing (MT), a relatively new testing method, and discusses how the new perspective of MT can help to conduct negative testing as well as to alleviate the oracle problem in the testing of security-related functionality and behavior. As demonstrated by the effectiveness of MT in detecting previously unknown bugs in real-world critical applications such as compilers and code obfuscators, we conclude that software testing should be conducted from diverse perspectives in order to achieve greater cybersecurity.
Citation
Computer (IEEE Computer)
Volume
49
Issue
6

Keywords

cybersecurity, metamorphic testing, test oracles, fuzz testing, correctness

Citation

Chen, T. , Kuo, F. , Ma, W. , Susilo, W. , Towey, D. , Voas, J. and Zhou, Z. (2016), Metamorphic Testing for Cybersecurity, Computer (IEEE Computer), [online], https://doi.org/10.1109/MC.2016.176, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=920197 (Accessed March 28, 2024)
Created June 26, 2016, Updated October 12, 2021