Professor Peter Bishop • City St George's, University of London

Contact details

About
Research
Publications
Professional activities

About

Overview

Peter Bishop is a Professor at the Centre for Software Reliability, sharing a joint chair in Systems and Software Dependability with Robin Bloomfield. He is also Chief Scientist at Adelard (part of NCC Group) which provides computer safety and dependability consultancy and research services to industry. He has BSc and MSc degrees in Physics and is a Chartered Engineer and Member of the IET.

Peter Bishop joined City University in 2001, and his research work includes software fault tolerance, design diversity, software reliability prediction and statistical testing, system safety and security, assurance case methodologies and their application in a range of industrial contexts (including the assurance strategies for autonomous vehicles).

At Adelard LLP, he undertakes research for the UK nuclear industry on a range of topics including smart device assessment. He has participated in a number of European research projects on assuring the safety of critical control systems. His consultancy work includes software assessment, security-informed safety assessment and assurance case construction for a range of clients in the nuclear, defence, transport, medical and financial sectors. He is currently involved safety assurance activities for the UK Nuclear New Build programme.

He was formerly employed in the research laboratories of the CEGB and National Power. Initially he was involved in the development of process automation. In later years his work was primarily concerned with software reliability research and assessment. He was heavily involved in the assessment of the Sizewell B Primary Protection System software and also undertook research into formal specification methods, verification and testing, software diversity and fault tolerance.

Research

Research interests

- Software fault tolerance
- Safety cases
- Software reliability
- Software diversity

Projects

- DISPO
- DIRC (2000-2006)

Publications

Featured publications

Bishop, P. and Povyakalo, A. (2017). Deriving a frequentist conservative confidence bound for probability of failure per demand for systems with different operational and test profiles. Reliability Engineering & System Safety, 158, pp. 246-253. doi:10.1016/j.ress.2016.08.019
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Littlewood, B., Popov, P., Povyakalo, A. and Strigini, L. (2014). A conservative bound for the probability of failure of a 1-out-of-2 protection system with one hardware-only and one software-based protection train. Reliability Engineering & System Safety, 130, pp. 61-68. doi:10.1016/j.ress.2014.04.002
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G., Bloomfiel, R.E., Cyra, L. and Not known, (2013). Combining Testing and Proof to Gain High Assurance in Software: a Case Study. (ISSRE 2013) IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering 4-7 November, Pasadena, CA, USA.
Littlewood, B., Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Povyakalo, A. and Wright, D. (2011). Towards a formalism for conservative claims about the dependability of software-based systems. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering. doi:10.1109/TSE.2010.67
[publisher’s website]
van der Meulen, M.J.P., Bishop, P.G. and Revilla, M. (2004). An exploration of software faults and failure behaviour in a large population of programs. 15th International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering 2-5 November.doi:10.1109/issre.2004.7
Bishop, P.G. Using reversible computing to achieve fail-safety. .
Bishop, P. and Bloomfield, R. (1996). A conservative theory for long-term reliability-growth prediction. IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON RELIABILITY, 45(4), pp. 550-560. doi:10.1109/24.556578
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G. (1995). Software Fault Tolerance by Design Diversity", Software Fault Tolerance, (Lyu, M., Eds.), Wiley, USA, Springer, ISBN 0-471-95068-8, 1995. Software Fault Tolerance (pp. 211-229). Wiley. ISBN 0471950688.
Bishop, P.G. (1993). The Variation of Software Survival Time for Different Operational Input Profiles. FTCS pp. 98-107
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G. (1990). Dependability of Critical Computers Systems 3: Techniques Directory. Elsevier Apllied Science. ISBN 1851665447.
BISHOP, P.G., ESP, D.G., BARNES, M., HUMPHREYS, P., DAHLL, G. and LAHTI, J. (1986). PODS - A PROJECT ON DIVERSE SOFTWARE. IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SOFTWARE ENGINEERING, 12(9), pp. 929-940. doi:10.1109/TSE.1986.6313048
Bishop, P.G. (1986). PODS a Project on Diverse Software. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, 12(9), pp. 929-940
[publisher’s website]

Publications by category

Chapter

Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Guerra, S. and Thuy, N. (2012). Safety justification frameworks: Integrating rule-based, goal-based and risk-informed approaches. 8th International Topical Meeting on Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control, and Human-Machine Interface Technologies 2012, NPIC and HMIT 2012: Enabling the Future of Nuclear Energy (pp. 1283-1290). ISBN 9781627480154.

Conference papers and proceedings (47)

Bishop, P., Povyakalo, A. and Strigini, L. Doubt in Safety Claims is Inevitable: What is its Impact, What Can be Done About It? .doi:10.1007/978-3-032-02018-5_17
Yates, D., Bishop, P., Fletcher, G., Guerra, S. and Di Buono, A. (2025). Digitisation of NPP I&C Systems via Wireless Technologies. Nuclear Plant Instrumentation and Control & Human-Machine Interface Technology 15-18 June, Chicago, US.doi:10.13182/NPICHMIT25-46778
Bishop, P.G., Povyakalo, A.A. and Strigini, L. (2024). How to reason about Risk, given Inevitable Doubt on Arguments for High Dependability. SAFECOMP 2024 17-20 September, Florence, Italy.
Bishop, P., Povyakalo, A. and Strigini, L. (2022). Bootstrapping confidence in future safety from past safe operation. 2022 IEEE 33rd International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering (ISSRE) 31 October-3 November.doi:10.1109/issre55969.2022.00020
Bishop, P., Fletcher, G., Guerra, S., Kuball, S. and Conmy, P.R. (2022). Proportionate Assurance of Smart Devices used in the UK Nuclear Industry. 32nd European Safety and Reliability Conference 28 August-7 September.doi:10.3850/978-981-18-5183-4_s11-10-433-cd
Bishop, P. and Povyakalo, A. Optimising the Reliability that Can Be Claimed for a Software-Based System Based on Failure-Free Tests of Its Components. .doi:10.1007/978-3-031-14835-4_24
Bloomfield, R.E., Bendele, M.M., Bishop, P.G., Stroud, R.J., Tonks, S., Lecompte, T.... Romanovsky, A. (2016). The risk assessment of ERTMS-based railway systems from a cyber security perspective: Methodology and lessons learned. Reliability, Safety and Security of Railway Systems (RSSRail 2016) 28-30 June, Paris.doi:10.1007/978-3-319-33951-1_1
Bishop, P. Modeling the Impact of Testing on Diverse Programs. .doi:10.1007/978-3-319-24255-2_22
Bishop, P.G., Strigini, L., Bondavalli, A. and Di Giandomenico, F. (2014). Estimating Worst Case Failure Dependency with Partial Knowledge of the Difficulty Function. 33rd International Conference, SAFECOMP 2014 10-9 January, Florence, Italy.doi:10.1007/978-3-319-10506-1
Bishop, P. and Strigini, L. Estimating Worst Case Failure Dependency with Partial Knowledge of the Difficulty Function. .doi:10.1007/978-3-319-10506-2_13
Bishop, P.G. (2013). Does software have to be ultra reliable in safety critical systems? SAFECOMP 2013, 32nd International Conference on Computer Safety, Reliability and Security 24-17 September, Toulouse, France.
Holmberg, J.E., Bishop, P., Guerra, S. and Thuy, N. Safety case framework to provide justifiable reliability numbers for software systems. .
Bishop, P.G. and Cyra, L. (2012). Overcoming Non-determinism in Testing Smart Devices: How to Build Models of Device Behaviour. 11th International Probabilistic Safety Assessment and Management Conference and the Annual European Safety and Reliability Conference 2012 (PSAM11 ESREL 2012) 25-29 June, Helsinki, Finland.
Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Gashi, I. and Stankovic, V. Diverse protection systems for improving security: a study with AntiVirus engines. .
Stankovic, V., Bloomfield, R., Bishop, P. and Gashi, I. Diversity for Security: a Study with Off-The-Shelf AntiVirus Engines. 21st International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering (ISSRE 2011) Hiroshima, Japan.
Bishop, P., Tourlas, K., Chozos, N. and Schoitsch, E. An Approach to Using Non Safety-Assured Programmable Components in Modest Integrity Systems. .
Bloomfield, R. and Bishop, P. Safety and Assurance Cases: Past, Present and Possible Future - an Adelard Perspective. .doi:10.1007/978-1-84996-086-1_4
Bishop, P., Gashi, I., Littlewood, B., Wright, D. and OConner, L. Reliability modeling of a 1-out-of-2 system: Research with diverse Off-the-shelf SQL database servers. .
Bishop, P.G. SILS and Software. UK Safety Critical Systems Newsletter.
Bishop, P.G. Estimating PLC logic program reliability. .
Bentley, J.G.W., Bishop, P.G. and van der Meulen, M. An empirical exploration of the difficulty function. .
Littlewood, B., Bloomfield, R., Popov, P., Povyakalo, A. and Strigini, L. The impact of ‘difficulty’ variation on the probability of coincident failure of diverse systems. International Conference on Control and Instrumentation in Nuclear Installations Liverpool.
Bishop, P.G. and Bloomfield, R.E. (2003). Using a Log-normal Failure Rate Distribution for Worst Case Bound Reliability Prediction. 14th IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering (ISSRE 2003) 17-20 November, Denver, Colorado.
Bishop, P.G. (2003). MC/DC based estimation and detection of residual faults in PLC logic networks. 14th IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering ISSRE 2003 17-20 November, Denver, Colorado.
Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Clement, T. and Guerra, S. Software criticality analysis of COTS/SOUP. .doi:10.1016/s0951-8320(03)00093-0
Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Clement, T., Guerra, S., Jones, C., Anderson, S.... Littlewood, B. Integrity static analysis of COTS/SOUP. .
Bishop, P.G. and Bloomfield, R.E. (2002). Worst Case Reliability Prediction Based on a Prior Estimate of Residual Defects. Thirteenth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering (ISSRE '02) 12-15 November, Annapolis, Maryland.
Bishop, P.G. (2002). Estimating Residual Faults from Code Coverage. SAFECOMP 2002 10-13 September, Catania, Italy.
Bishop, P.G., Bloomfield, R.E., Clement, T., Guerra, S., Anderson, S., Bologna, S.... Felici, M. Software Criticality Analysis of COTS/SOUP. .
Bishop, P.G., Penny, J., Eaton, A., Bloomfield, R., Redmill, F. and Anderson, T. (2001). The Practicalities of Goal-Based Safety Regulation. Ninth Safety-Critical Systems Symposium 6-8 February, Bristol, UK.
Bishop, P.G. and Bloomfield, R.E. (1998). A Methodology for Safety Case Development. Safety-critical Systems Symposium 98 February-, Birmingham, UK.
Bishop, P.G., Bloomfield, R.E. and Rabe, G. (1995). The SHIP Safety Case. SafeComp 95, Proc. 14th IFAC Conf. on Computer Safety, Reliability and Security 11-13 October, Belgirate, Italy,.
Bishop, P.G. and Bloomfield, R.E. (1995). The SHIP Safety Case - A Combination of System and Software Methods. 14th IFAC Conf. on Computer Safety, Reliability and Security (SafeComp95) 11-13 October, Belgirate, Italy.
Bishop, P.G., Burns, G. and Anderson, S.O. (1993). Stepwise Development and Verification of a Boiler System Specification. International Workshop on the Design and Review of Software Controlled Safety-related Systems 28-29 June, National Research Council, Ottawa, Canada.
Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. A Random Walk through Software Reliability Theory. Mathematical Structures for Software Engineering.
Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. (1989). Failure Masking - A Source of Dependency in Multi-Version Programming. Int. Working Conference on Dependable Computing Applications August-, Santa Barbara, USA.
Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. (1989). Failure Masking - A Source of Dependency in Multi-Version Programming. Int. Working Conference on Dependable Computing Applications August-, Santa Barbara, USA.
Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. (1988). Probabilistic Modelling of Software Failure Characteristics. SAFECOMP 88 November-, Fulda, Germany.
Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. (1988). PODS Revisited - A Study of Software Failure Behaviour. Eighteenth Fault Tolerant Computing Symposium (FTCS-18) June-, Tokyo.
Bishop, P.G. and et al, STEM: a Project on Software Test and Evaluation Methods. Safety and Reliability Society Symposium 1987 (SARS 87) Altrincham, Manchester.
Bishop, P.G. The PODS Diversity Experiment. Dependable Computing and Fault Tolerant Systems.
Lilley, R.A., Seymour, C., Bishop, P.G. and Pullen, F.D. CO-ORDINATED SUBSTATION CONTROL AND MONITORING. .
Bishop, P., Esp, D., Barnes, M., Humphreys, P., Dahll, G., Lahti, J.... Yoshimura, S. Project on Diverse Software — An Experiment in Software Reliability. .doi:10.1016/s1474-6670(17)60099-5
Bishop, P.G., Brewer, C. and Jervis, P. DESIGN OF SOFTWARE FOR DISTRIBUTED COMPUTER CONTROL SYSTEMS. .
Bishop, P.G. MULTI-PROCESSOR SIMULATOR FOR A NETWORK OF CO-OPERATING MICROPROCESSORS. .
Bishop, P.G. DESIGN OF AN INPUT/OUTPUT SCHEDULER WRITTEN IN A HIGH LEVEL LANGUAGE. .
Bishop, P.G. and Bloomfield, R.E. A conservative theory for long term reliability growth prediction. ISSRE '96: 7th International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering.doi:10.1109/issre.1996.558887

Journal articles (11)

Bishop, P. and Povyakalo, A. (2020). A conservative confidence bound for the probability of failure on demand of a software-based system based on failure-free tests of its components. Reliability Engineering & System Safety, 203, pp. 107060-107060. doi:10.1016/j.ress.2020.107060
[publisher’s website]
Bloomfield, R., Bishop, P., Butler, E. and Stroud, R. (2018). Security-Informed Safety: Supporting Stakeholders with Codes of Practice. Computer, 51(8), pp. 60-65. doi:10.1109/mc.2018.3191260
[publisher’s website]
Bloomfield, R., Bishop, P., Butler, E. and Netkachova, K. (2017). Using an Assurance Case Framework to Develop Security Strategy and Policies. pp. 27-38. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-66284-8_3
[publisher’s website]
Guerra, S., Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R. and Sheridan, D. (2010). Assessment and qualification of smart sensors. 7th International Topical Meeting on Nuclear Plant Instrumentation Control and Human Machine Interface Technologies 2010 Npic and Hmit 2010, 1, pp. 499-510
Bishop, P. and Cyra, L. (2010). Overcoming Non-determinism in Testing Smart Devices: A Case Study. pp. 237-250. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-15651-9_18
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P., Bloomfield, R., Guerra, S. and Tourlas, K. (2005). Justification of smart sensors for nuclear applications. Lecture Notes in Computer Science Including Subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics, 3688 LNCS, pp. 194-207. doi:10.1007/11563228_15
[publisher’s website]
Dahll, G., Barnes, M. and Bishop, P. (1990). Software diversity: Way to enhance safety? Information and Software Technology, 32(10), pp. 677-685. doi:10.1016/0950-5849(90)90100-6
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G. (1979). The design of software for distributed control systems. Microprocessing and Microprogramming, 5(6), pp. 358-362. doi:10.1016/0165-6074(79)90080-2
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G. (1979). The design of software for distributed control systems. Euromicro Newsletter, 5(6), pp. 358-362. doi:10.1016/0303-1268(79)90152-4
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G., Jones, W.S. and Wells, A.V. (1978). Microcomputers. miracle or myth? Electronics and Power, 24(3), pp. 196-196. doi:10.1049/ep.1978.0121
[publisher’s website]
Bishop, P.G. (1976). Microprocessors: Computing in miniature. Physics in Technology, 7(2), pp. 47-53. doi:10.1088/0305-4624/7/2/301
[publisher’s website]

Reports (6)

Bishop, P.G. and Povyakalo, A.A. Optimising the reliability that can be claimed for a software-based system based on failure-free tests of its components..
Bishop, P.G., Bloomfield, R.E., Emmet, L.O., Johnson, C., Black, W., Hamilton, V.... Koorneef, F. (2003). Learning from incidents involving E/E/PE systems, Part 1: Review of methods and industry practice. http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr179.htm. ISBN 071762787X.
Bishop, P.G., Emmet, L.O., Johnson, C. and Black, W. (2003). Learning from incidents involving E/E/PE systems, Part 2: Recommended scheme. http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr181.htm. ISBN 0717627896.
Bishop, P.G., Emmet, L.O., Johnson, C. and Black, W. (2003). Learning from incidents involving E/E/PE systems, Part 3: Guidance examples and rationale. http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr182.htm. ISBN 071762790X.
Bishop, P.G., Jones, C.C.M., Bloomfield, R.E. and Froome, P.K.D. (2001). Methods for assessing the safety integrity of safety-related software of uncertain pedigree (SOUP).. ISBN 0717620115.
Bishop, P.G., Bloomfield, R.E. and Froome, P.K.D. Justifying the use of software of uncertain pedigree (SOUP) in safety-related applications. May 2001. ISBN 0717620107.

Working paper

Bishop, P., Povyakalo, A. and Strigini, L. (2024). How to reason about Risk, given Inevitable Doubt on Arguments for High Dependability. Position paper presented at SAFECOMP 2024 conference

Professional activities

Keynote lectures/speeches (2)

Invited Talk on:"General Requirements on Certification" for the Vienna Summer School. Baden Wien, Austria (2005). An invited contribution to the Vienna Summer School on the topic of "Architectural Paradigms for Dependable Embedded Systems", 12 - 16 September 2005
Philips Software Conference Tutorial. Eindhoven, Netherlands (2005). Invited Tutorial on software reliability

Other (2)

Member of the College of Reviewers for the Canada Research Chairs Program. There are two types of Chairs: Tier 1 Chairs (seven year term, renewable indefinitely, $200K per annum) are offered to outstanding researchers recognized as world leaders in their field; Tier 2 Chairs (five year term, renewable once, $100K per annum) are offered to exceptional emerging researchers. For more information, please visit our Web site at www.chairs-chaires.gc.ca. .
Member IET (Institution of Engineering and Technology) .