Biblio

Intelligent software applications are becoming ubiquitous and pervasive affecting various aspects of our lives and livelihoods. At the same time, the risks to which these systems expose the organizations and end users are growing dramatically. Trustworthiness of software applications is becoming a paramount necessity. Trust is to be regarded as a first-class citizen in the total product life cycle and should be addressed across all stages of software development. Trust can be looked at from two facets: one at an algorithmic level (e.g., bias-free, discrimination-aware, explainable and interpretable techniques) and the other at a process level by making development processes more transparent, auditable, and adhering to regulations and best practices. In this paper, we address the latter and propose a blockchain enabled governance framework for building trustworthy software. Our framework supports the recording, monitoring, and analysis of various activities throughout the application development life cycle thereby bringing in transparency and auditability. It facilitates the specification of regulations and best practices and verifies for its adherence raising alerts of non-compliance and prescribes remedial measures.

Compressive Sampling and Sparse reconstruction theory is applied to a linearly frequency modulated continuous wave hybrid lidar/radar system. The goal is to show that high resolution time of flight measurements to underwater targets can be obtained utilizing far fewer samples than dictated by Nyquist sampling theorems. Traditional mixing/down-conversion and matched filter signal processing methods are reviewed and compared to the Compressive Sampling and Sparse Reconstruction methods. Simulated evidence is provided to show the possible sampling rate reductions, and experiments are used to observe the effects that turbid underwater environments have on recovery. Results show that by using compressive sensing theory and sparse reconstruction, it is possible to achieve significant sample rate reduction while maintaining centimeter range resolution.

The Polish Power System is becoming increasingly more dependent on Information and Communication Technologies which results in its exposure to cyberattacks, including the evolved and highly sophisticated threats such as Advanced Persistent Threats or Distributed Denial of Service attacks. The most exposed components are SCADA systems in substations and Distributed Control Systems in power plants. When addressing this situation the usual cyber security technologies are prerequisite, but not sufficient. With the rapidly evolving cyber threat landscape the use of partnerships and information sharing has become critical. However due to several anonymity concerns the relevant stakeholders may become reluctant to exchange sensitive information about security incidents. In the paper a multi-agent architecture is presented for the Polish Power System which addresses the anonymity concerns.

Security of secret data has been a major issue of concern from ancient time. Steganography and cryptography are the two techniques which are used to reduce the security threat. Cryptography is an art of converting secret message in other than human readable form. Steganography is an art of hiding the existence of secret message. These techniques are required to protect the data theft over rapidly growing network. To achieve this there is a need of such a system which is very less susceptible to human visual system. In this paper a new technique is going to be introducing for data transmission over an unsecure channel. In this paper secret data is compressed first using LZW algorithm before embedding it behind any cover media. Data is compressed to reduce its size. After compression data encryption is performed to increase the security. Encryption is performed with the help of a key which make it difficult to get the secret message even if the existence of the secret message is reveled. Now the edge of secret message is detected by using canny edge detector and then embedded secret data is stored there with the help of a hash function. Proposed technique is implemented in MATLAB and key strength of this project is its huge data hiding capacity and least distortion in Stego image. This technique is applied over various images and the results show least distortion in altered image.

This paper presents the Bit Error Rate (BER) performance of the wireless communication system. The complexity of modern wireless communication system are increasing at fast pace. It becomes challenging to design the hardware of wireless system. The proposed system consists of MIMO transmitter and MIMO receiver along with the along with a realistic fading channel. To make the data transmission more secure when the data are passed into channel Crypto-System with Embedded Error Control (CSEEC) is used. The system supports data security and reliability using forward error correction codes (FEC). Security is provided through the use of a new symmetric encryption algorithm, and reliability is provided by the use of FEC codes. The system aims at speeding up the encryption and encoding operations and reduces the hardware dedicated to each of these operations. The proposed system allows users to achieve more security and reliable communication. The proposed BER measurement communication system consumes low power compared to existing systems. Advantage of VLSI based BER measurement it that they can be used in the Real time applications and it provides single chip solution.

Blockchain is a database technology that provides the integrity and trust of the system can't make arbitrary modifications and deletions by being an append-only distributed ledger. That is, the blockchain is not a modification or deletion but a CRAB (Create-Retrieve-Append-Burn) method in which data can be read and written according to a legitimate user's access right(For example, owner private key). However, this can not delete the created data once, which causes problems such as privacy breach. In this paper, we propose an on-off block-chained Hybrid Blockchain system to separate the data and save the connection history to the blockchain. In addition, the state is changed to the distributed database separately from the ledger record, and the state is changed by generating the arbitrary injection in the XOR form, so that the history of modification / deletion of the Off Blockchain can be efficiently retrieved.

In this paper, a time-driven performance-aware mathematical model for trust in the robot is proposed for a Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) framework. The proposed trust model is based on both the human operator and the robot performances. The human operator’s performance is modeled based on both the physical and cognitive performances, while the robot performance is modeled over its unpredictable, predictable, dependable, and faithful operation regions. The model is validated via different simulation scenarios. The simulation results show that the trust in the robot in the HRC framework is governed by robot performance and human operator’s performance and can be improved by enhancing the robot performance.

Research has observed context factors like occasion and time as influential factors for predicting whether or not to share a location with online friends. In other domains like social networks, personality was also found to play an important role. Furthermore, users are seeking a fine-grained disclosement policy that also allows them to display an obfuscated location, like the center of the current city, to some of their friends. In this paper, we observe which context factors and personality measures can be used to predict the correct privacy level out of seven privacy levels, which include obfuscation levels like center of the street or current city. Our results show that a prediction is possible with a precision 20% better than a constant value. We will give design indications to determine which context factors should be recorded, and how much the precision can be increased if personality and privacy measures are recorded using either a questionnaire or automated text analysis.

Research has observed context factors like occasion and time as influential factors for predicting whether or not to share a location with online friends. In other domains like social networks, personality was also found to play an important role. Furthermore, users are seeking a fine-grained disclosement policy that also allows them to display an obfuscated location, like the center of the current city, to some of their friends. In this paper, we observe which context factors and personality measures can be used to predict the correct privacy level out of seven privacy levels, which include obfuscation levels like center of the street or current city. Our results show that a prediction is possible with a precision 20% better than a constant value. We will give design indications to determine which context factors should be recorded, and how much the precision can be increased if personality and privacy measures are recorded using either a questionnaire or automated text analysis.

This paper focuses on optimizing the sigmoid filter for detecting Low-Rate DoS attacks. Though sigmoid filter could help for detecting the attacker, it could severely affect the network efficiency. Unlike high rate attacks, Low-Rate DoS attacks such as ``Shrew'' and ``New Shrew'' are hard to detect. Attackers choose a malicious low-rate bandwidth to exploit the TCP's congestion control window algorithm and the re-transition timeout mechanism. We simulated the attacker traffic by editing using NS3. The Sigmoid filter was used to create a threshold bandwidth filter at the router that allowed a specific bandwidth, so when traffic that exceeded the threshold occurred, it would be dropped, or it would be redirected to a honey-pot server, instead. We simulated the Sigmoid filter using MATLAB and took the attacker's and legitimate user's traffic generated by NS-3 as the input for the Sigmoid filter in the MATLAB. We run the experiment three times with different threshold values correlated to the TCP packet size. We found the probability to detect the attacker traffic as follows: the first was 25%, the second 50% and the third 60%. However, we observed a drop in legitimate user traffic with the following probabilities, respectively: 75%, 50%, and 85%.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) also known as drones are being used in many applications where they can record or stream videos. One interesting application is the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and public safety applications where drones record videos and send them to a control center for further analysis. These videos are shared by various clients such as law enforcement or emergency personnel. In such cases, the recording might include faces of civilians or other sensitive information that might pose privacy concerns. While the video can be encrypted and stored in the cloud that way, it can still be accessed once the keys are exposed to third parties which is completely insecure. To prevent such insecurity, in this paper, we propose proxy re-encryption based sharing scheme to enable third parties to access only limited videos without having the original encryption key. The costly pairing operations in proxy re-encryption are not used to allow rapid access and delivery of the surveillance videos to third parties. The key management is handled by a trusted control center, which acts as the proxy to re-encrypt the data. We implemented and tested the approach in a realistic simulation environment using different resolutions under ns-3. The implementation results and comparisons indicate that there is an acceptable overhead while it can still preserve the privacy of drivers and passengers.

The subsystem of IoMT (Internet of Military of Things) called IoBT (Internet of Battle of Things) is the major resource of the military where the various stack holders of the battlefield and different categories of equipment are tightly integrated through the internet. The proposed architecture mentioned in this paper will be helpful to design IoBT effectively for warfare using irresistible technologies like information technology, embedded technology, and network technology. The role of Machine intelligence is essential in IoBT to create smart things and provide accurate solutions without human intervention. Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) is used in Industries to examine and analyze the invisible defects of equipment. Generally, the ultrasonic waves are used to examine and analyze the internal defects of materials. Hence the proposed architecture of IoBT is enhanced by ultrasonic based NDT to study the properties of the things of the battlefield without causing any damage.

The recent malware outbreaks have shown that the existing end-point security solutions are not robust enough to secure the systems from getting compromised. The techniques, like code obfuscation along with one or more zero-days, are used by malware developers for evading the security systems. These malwares are used for large-scale attacks involving Advanced Persistent Threats(APT), Botnets, Cryptojacking, etc. Cryptojacking poses a severe threat to various organizations and individuals. We are summarising multiple methods available for the detection of malware.

Data security is a major requirement of smart meter communication to control server through Advanced Metering infrastructure. Easy access of smart meters and multi-faceted nature of AMI communication network are the main reasons of smart meter facing large number of attacks. The different topology, bandwidth and heterogeneity in communication network prevent the existing security mechanisms in satisfying the security requirements of smart meter. Hence, advanced security mechanisms are essential to encrypt smart meter data before transmitting to control server. The emerging biocryptography technique has several advantages over existing techniques and is most suitable for providing security to communication of low processing devices like smart meter. In this paper, a lightweight encryption scheme using DNA sequence with suitable key management scheme is proposed for secure communication of smart meter in an efficient way. The proposed 2-phase DNA cryptography provides confidentiality and integrity to transmitted data and the authentication of keys is attained by exchanging through Diffie Hellman scheme. The strength of proposed encryption scheme is analyzed and its efficiency is evaluated by simulating an AMI communication network using Simulink/Matlab. Comparison of simulation results with various techniques show that the proposed scheme is suitable for secure communication of smart meter data.

Emerging communication technologies in distributed network systems require transfer of biometric digital images with high security. Network security is identified by the changes in system behavior which is either Dynamic or Deterministic. Performance computation is complex in dynamic system where cryptographic techniques are not highly suitable. Chaotic theory solves complex problems of nonlinear deterministic system. Several chaotic methods are combined to get hyper chaotic system for more security. Chaotic theory along with DNA sequence enhances security of biometric image encryption. Implementation proves the encrypted image is highly chaotic and resistant to various attacks.

Recognition of facial expressions authenticity is quite troublesome for humans. Therefore, it is an interesting topic for the computer vision community, as the developed algorithms for facial expressions authenticity estimation may be used as indicators of deception. This paper discusses the state-of-the art methods developed for smile veracity estimation and proposes a plan of development and validation of a novel approach to automated discrimination between genuine and posed facial expressions. The proposed fully automated technique is based on the extension of the high-dimensional Local Binary Patterns (LBP) to the spatio-temporal domain and combines them with the dynamics of facial landmarks movements. The proposed technique will be validated on several existing smile databases and a novel database created with the use of a high speed camera. Finally, the developed framework will be applied for the detection of deception in real life scenarios.

The rapid evolution of the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) services transforms the conventional electrical grid into a new paradigm called Smart Grid (SG). Even though SG brings significant improvements, such as increased reliability and better energy management, it also introduces multiple security challenges. One of the main reasons for this is that SG combines a wide range of heterogeneous technologies, including Internet of Things (IoT) devices as well as Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems. The latter are responsible for monitoring and controlling the automatic procedures of energy transmission and distribution. Nevertheless, the presence of these systems introduces multiple vulnerabilities because their protocols do not implement essential security mechanisms such as authentication and access control. In this paper, we focus our attention on the security issues of the IEC 60870-5-104 (IEC-104) protocol, which is widely utilized in the European energy sector. In particular, we provide a SCADA threat model based on a Coloured Petri Net (CPN) and emulate four different types of cyber attacks against IEC-104. Last, we used AlienVault's risk assessment model to evaluate the risk level that each of these cyber attacks introduces to our system to confirm our intuition about their severity.

Database outsourcing introduces a new paradigm, called Database as a Service (DBaaS). Database Service Providers (DSPs) have the ability to host outsourced databases and provide efficient facilities for their users. However, the data and the execution of database queries are under the control of the DSP, which is not always a trusted authority. Therefore, our problem is to ensure the outsourced database security. To address this problem, we propose a Secure scheme to provide Confidentiality and Integrity of Query results for Cloud Databases (SCIQ-CD). The performance analysis shows that our proposed scheme is secure and efficient for practical deployment.

We propose an efficient recommendation algorithm, by incorporating the side information of users' trust and distrust social relationships into the learning process of a Joint Non-negative Matrix Factorization technique based on Signed Graphs, namely JNMF-SG. The key idea in this study is to generate clusters based on signed graphs, considering positive and negative weights for the trust and distrust relationships, respectively. Using a spectral clustering approach for signed graphs, the clusters are extracted on condition that users with positive connections should lie close, while users with negative ones should lie far. Then, we propose a Joint Non-negative Matrix factorization framework, by generating the final recommendations, using the user-item and user-cluster associations over the joint factorization. In our experiments with a dataset from a real-world social media platform, we show that we significantly increase the recommendation accuracy, compared to state-of-the-art methods that also consider the trust and distrust side information in matrix factorization.

Deep learning is a highly effective machine learning technique for large-scale problems. The optimization of nonconvex functions in deep learning literature is typically restricted to the class of first-order algorithms. These methods rely on gradient information because of the computational complexity associated with the second derivative Hessian matrix inversion and the memory storage required in large scale data problems. The reward for using second derivative information is that the methods can result in improved convergence properties for problems typically found in a non-convex setting such as saddle points and local minima. In this paper we introduce TRMinATR - an algorithm based on the limited memory BFGS quasi-Newton method using trust region - as an alternative to gradient descent methods. TRMinATR bridges the disparity between first order methods and second order methods by continuing to use gradient information to calculate Hessian approximations. We provide empirical results on the classification task of the MNIST dataset and show robust convergence with preferred generalization characteristics.

There are currently few methods that can be applied to malware classification problems which don't require domain knowledge to apply. In this work, we develop our new SHWeL feature vector representation, by extending the recently proposed Lempel-Ziv Jaccard Distance. These SHWeL vectors improve upon LZJD's accuracy, outperform byte n-grams, and allow us to build efficient algorithms for both training (a weakness of byte n-grams) and inference (a weakness of LZJD). Furthermore, our new SHWeL method also allows us to directly tackle the class imbalance problem, which is common for malware-related tasks. Compared to existing methods like SMOTE, SHWeL provides significantly improved accuracy while reducing algorithmic complexity to O(N). Because our approach is developed without the use of domain knowledge, it can be easily re-applied to any new domain where there is a need to classify byte sequences.

Suppose that you are at a music festival checking on an artist, and you would like to quickly know about the song that is being played (e.g., title, lyrics, album, etc.). If you have a smartphone, you could record a sample of the live performance and compare it against a database of existing recordings from the artist. Services such as Shazam or SoundHound will not work here, as this is not the typical framework for audio fingerprinting or query-by-humming systems, as a live performance is neither identical to its studio version (e.g., variations in instrumentation, key, tempo, etc.) nor it is a hummed or sung melody. We propose an audio fingerprinting system that can deal with live version identification by using image processing techniques. Compact fingerprints are derived using a log-frequency spectrogram and an adaptive thresholding method, and template matching is performed using the Hamming similarity and the Hough Transform.

Application-level data management middleware solutions are becoming increasingly compelling to deal with the complexity of a multi-cloud or federated cloud storage and multitenant storage architecture. However, these systems typically support traditional data mapping strategies that are created under the assumption of a fixed and rigorous database schema, and mapping data objects while supporting varying data confidentiality requirements therefore leads to fragmentation of data over distributed storage nodes. This introduces performance over-head at the level of individual database transactions and negatively affects the overall scalability. This paper discusses these challenges and highlights the potential of leveraging the data schema flexibility of NoSQL databases to accomplish dynamic and fine-grained data encryption in a more efficient and scalable manner. We illustrate these ideas in the context of an industrial multi-tenant SaaS application.

The following is a research conducted on the Dark Web to study and identify the ins and outs of the dark web, what the dark web is all about, the various methods available to access the dark web and many others. The researchers have also included the steps and precautions taken before the dark web was opened. Apart from that, the findings and the website links / URL are also included along with a description of the sites. The primary usage of the dark web and some of the researcher's experience has been further documented in this research paper.