Program
Note. All times are Japan Standard Time (JST).
Time zone conversions. PDT US: -16h ; EDT US: -13h ; BST UK -9h ; CEST Europe: -8h ; AEST Australia: +2h

Welcome (5 minutes, 09:00 - 09:05) 

09:00 Opening Remarks

Ewen Denney (KBR / NASA Ames Research Center, USA) 

Session 1. Assurance and Dependability Standards (85 minutes, 09:05 - 10:30)

Chair: Ewen Denney (KBR / NASA Ames Research Center, USA)

09:05 Invited Talk. Standards on Assurance

Yoshiki Kinoshita (Kanagawa University, Japan)

Abstract. Assurance is defined as “grounds for justified confidence that a claim has been or will be achieved” in ISO/IEC/IEEE 15026 Systems and software assurance, a series of four international standards, whose overview is given in this talk. Its Part 1 provides the concepts vocabulary; Part 2 specifies the structure of assurance cases and compares its terminology with those of forum standards such as GSN and SACM; Part 3 provides the concept of integrity levels enabling the concept of “degree” of confidence, which is central in practical treatment of assurance; Part 4 provides guidance and recommendations for assurance of selected claims about the system-of-interest by achieving a claim and showing its achievement. Relationship between assurance and dependability will then be discussed in the context of definitions given in these international standards.  Assurance can be considered for a number of system attributes including dependability. Assurance for dependability in particular is one of the principles of dependability management. 

09:30 Invited Talk. Standards on Dependability (Online)

Jean Cross (University of New South Wales, Australia)

Abstract. Dependability is defined as the ability to perform as required. It is an umbrella term that covers reliability, availability, maintainability, and supportability. Other attributes such as durability, resilience  and robustness can also be considered as part of dependability. TC 56 is in the process of publishing a suite of standards that we refer to as the core standards. The head document, published earlier this year, is IEC 60300-1 Dependability Management — Part 1 — Managing dependability. This standard explains how dependability considerations can be incorporated into management systems such as quality management and security management, and be audited as part of those management systems. The standard also describes the management and technical activities and tasks that can be needed to achieve and verify dependable systems products and services and provides some guidance on how a tailored programme of activities could be put together. Other standards in the series are IEC 60300 3-4 (which provides high level guidance guidance  for how to specify  dependability requirements in a way that can be verified) and programme level standards for reliability, availability, maintainability and maintenance, and supportability and support. The attributes of reliability, availability, maintainability and supportability are to a large extent built in at the design stage and can be difficult to improve in service. The philosophy therefore is to provide assurance throughout design and development that requirements will be met. This can be through an assurance case, or through analysis, prediction and testing through development. This talk gives an overview of these core standards and their approach to verification and assurance of dependability requirements. Other standards that are expected to be published by the end of the year including Human aspects of dependability and project risk management are briefly mentioned.

10:00 The SOTIF Meta-Algorithm: Quantitative Analyses of the Safety of Autonomous Behaviors (Online)

Carmen Carlan (Edge Case Research GmbH, Germany), Noah Carlson (Edge Case Research Inc., USA),
Chris Dwyer (Edge Case Research Inc., USA), Manoja Hirannaiah (Edge Case Research GmbH, Germany), and
Michael Wagner (Edge Case Research Inc., USA) 

Morning Coffee Break (30 minutes, 10:30 - 11:00)

Session 2. AI and ML Assurance - 1 (75 minutes, 11:00 - 12:15)

Chair: Ganesh Pai (KBR / NASA Ames Research Center, USA) 

11:00 Models are Central to AI Assurance 

John Rushby (SRI International, USA), and Robin Bloomfield (City, University of London, UK)

11:15 Supporting Change Impact Assessment with LLMs

Torin Viger (University of Toronto, Canada), Logan Murphy (University of Toronto, Canada),
Simon Diemert (University of Victoria, Canada), Claudio Menghi (University of Bergamo, Italy), and
Marsha Chechik (University of Toronto, Canada)

11:30 Removing the Big Red Button: Uncrewed Ground Vehicles in Complex Military Environments

Alec Banks (Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, UK), Prathyush Menon (University of Exeter, UK), and
Steve Austen (SC Group, Ltd., UK)

11:45 Developing Assurance Cases for Adversarial Robustness and Regulatory Compliance in LLMs (Online)

Tomas Bueno Momcilovic (Fortiss GmbH, Germany), Dian Balta (Fortiss GmbH, Germany),
Beat Buesser (IBM Research Europe, Switzerland), Giulio Zizzo (IBM Research Europe, Ireland), and
Mark Purcell (IBM Research Europe, Ireland)

Lightning Session. Tool Demonstrations (18 minutes, 12:15 - 12:33)

Chair: Shuji Kinoshita (Advanced Institute of Industrial Technology, Japan)

12:15 Socrates

Simon Diemert (Critical Systems Labs, Canada)

12:18 nLoop Live Safety Case

Garrett Bonfanti (Edge Case Research, Inc., USA), and Carmen Carlan (Edge Case Research GmbH, Germany)

12: 21 D-CASE Communicator

Yutaka Matsuno (Nihon University, Japan) 

12:24 Astah System Safety 

Toshinori Takai (NARA Institute of Science and Technology, Japan) 

12:27 Adelard Safety Case Environment (ASCE)

Robin Bloomfield (City, University of London, and Adelard, part of NCC Group, UK)

12:30 Assurance Case Automation Toolset (AdvoCATE)

Ewen Denney (KBR / NASA Ames Research Center, USA) 

Lunch Break (90 minutes, 12:30 - 14:00) 

Provided onsite at the workshop venue

Session 3. Assurance Cases and Processes (90 minutes, 14:00 - 15:30)

Chair: Yutaka Matsuno (Nihon University, Japan)

14:00 SynBioTrace: Integrating Safety and Security Artifacts to Build Assurance Cases for Synthetic Biology Applications (Online)

Justin Firestone (University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA), Myra B. Cohen (Iowa State University, USA), and
Robyn R. Lutz (Iowa State University, USA)

14:30 Using Boundary Objects for Continuous Compliance in Automotive Development

Anthony Shenouda (McMaster University, Canada), Tiziano Santilli (Gran Sasso Science Institute, Italy),
Faezeh Siavashi (McMaster University, Canada), Thomas Chiang (McMaster University, Canada),
Nicholas Annable (McMaster University, Canada), Horacio Hoyos Rodriguez (McMaster University, Canada),
Richard Paige (McMaster University, Canada), Patrizio Pelliccione (Gran Sasso Science Institute, Italy),
Mark Lawford (McMaster University, Canada), Alan Wassyng (McMaster University, Canada), and
Vera Pantelic (McMaster University, Canada)

15:00 A Digital Assurance Framework

Mauricio Castillo-Effen (Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Laboratories, USA),
Carter Veldhuizen (Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Laboratories, USA), and
Charles Lutz (Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Laboratories, USA)

15:15 Generating Understandable and Reusable Safety Assurance Cases Using Workflow+ (Online)

Nicholas Annable (McMaster University, Canada), Mark Lawford (McMaster University, Canada),
Richard Paige (McMaster University, Canada), and Alan Wassyng (McMaster University, Canada)

Afternoon Coffee Break (30 minutes, 15:30 - 16:00) 

Session 4. AI and ML Assurance - 2 (90 minutes, 16:00 - 17:30)

Chair: Yoshiki Kinoshita (Kanagawa University, Japan)

16:00 Towards the Certification of an Evacuation Assistance System Utilizing AI-based Approaches

Georg Hägele (ASSA ABLOY Entrance Systems, Sweden), Abdelbaki Bouguerra (University of M'sila, Algeria), and Arezoo Sarkheyli-Hägele (Malmö University, Sweden)

16:30 Quantifying Lower Reliability Bounds of Deep Neural Networks (Online)

Max Scheerer (FZI Research Center for Information Technology, Germany), Marius Take (FZI Research Center for Information Technology, Germany), and Jonas Klamroth (FZI Research Center for Information Technology, Germany)

17:00 Defect-based Testing for Safety-critical ML Components (Online)

Amit Sahu (Edge Case Research GmbH, Germany), and Carmen Carlan (Edge Case Research GmbH, Germany)

Conclusion (5 minutes, 17:30 - 17:35)

17:30 Closing Remarks 

Yoshiki Kinoshita (Kanagawa University, Japan)