Abstract
Although in the last decade we have seen a rapid increase in technological and academic developments in the domain of autonomous systems, ensuring the safety of these systems remains extremely challenging. Previously, the concept of dynamic safety cases (DSCs), ConSerts and runtime monitoring frameworks have been presented as an engineering solution for through-life safety assurance. However, these techniques will (initially) be only as good as the claims or rules they hold. Therefore, in this paper we provide a critical view on the use of STPA as a safety and risk analysis technique underlying the design of autonomous systems to aid with the system design and runtime safety assurance. Based on two case studies, we conclude that STPA is a promising technique towards safer autonomous systems. Although hazard generation and modularisation are not easy, we argue that STPA provides a different view on safety which aligns much better with an autonomous system view.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Simon Whiteley for his guidance and invaluable feedback on STPA. We are also grateful to M. Conradie for the numerous discussions on the work. The research has received funding from VLAIO under grand agreement number HBC.2020.2088 (Safety Assurance 4.0 - Management of Safety Risks in Industry 4.0).
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Buysse, L., Vanoost, D., Vankeirsbilck, J., Boydens, J., Pissoort, D. (2022). Case Study Analysis of STPA as Basis for Dynamic Safety Assurance of Autonomous Systems. In: Marrone, S., et al. Dependable Computing – EDCC 2022 Workshops. EDCC 2022. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1656. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-16245-9_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-16245-9_3
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