Soft Walls in Security

As necessity is the mother of invention, sometimes tragedy reveals what we need. A few years ago I ran across some work in aviation aimed at preventing another September 11. The system was called Soft Walls (http://softwalls.eecs.berkeley.edu/), and the general idea was a proxy would exist within the avionics of commercial aircraft. This system would create virtual borders around critical areas, providing forced feedback against a pilots yoke.

The specific implementation of this plan introduces a number of security challenges, but the idea itself fits well with what security should feel like. You only feel the restrictions of the system as you try to do something questionable. The harder you try and perform restricted activity, the harder the system pushes back.