Software-implemented fault injection, abbreviated as SWIFI, uses a variety of software-based techniques for inserting faults or errors in a system-under-study. These techniques may range from pre-runtime approaches, such as the modification of the binary executable or source code to introduce the fault [FIN1], to runtime approaches, such as using software traps to halt execution and inject a fault in specific locations of the processor and/or the program under execution [FIN2]. SWIFI is adaptable to various hardware architectures and can implement most fault models, including models that represent hardware faults (e.g., single and multiple bit-flips in CPU registers and memory) [FIN2] and software faults (e.g., code mutations that mimic the most common real software faults) [FIN1], [FIN3], [FIN4].  

Usually, fault injectionIt can be employed to evaluate the dependability of a system, identify failure modes and estimate their probability of occurrence, validate fault tolerance mechanisms and measure various fault and error coverages, as well as latencies (see, for example, [FIN5]).