Policy-agnostic programming on the client-side

Browser security has become a major concern especially due to web pages becoming more complex. These web applications handle a lot of information, including sensitive data that may be vulnerable to attacks like data exfiltration, cross-site scripting (XSS), etc. Most modern browsers have security mechanisms in place to prevent such attacks but they still fall short in preventing more advanced attacks like evolved variants of data exfiltration. Moreover, there is no standard that is followed to implement security into the browser. A lot of research has been done in the field of information flow security that could prove to be helpful in solving the problem of securing the client-side. Policy- agnostic programming is a programming paradigm that aims to make implementation of information flow security in real world systems more flexible. In this paper, we explore the use of policy-agnostic programming on the client-side and how it will help prevent common client-side attacks. We verify our results through a client-side salary management application. We show a possible attack and how our solution would prevent such an attack

The role of African Union law in integrating Africa

This article traces how the development of regional law is linked to the state of regional integration in Africa. Given the prominent role European Union law plays in the functioning of the European Union, the question is posed whether there is similar scope for the development of ‘African Union law’, a term not established hitherto. Initially devoid from the necessary supranational elements required to adopt law that would automatically bind member states, the African Union is leaning towards a functionalist approach paving the way for transfer of sovereign powers to African Union institutions. It is argued that law-making capacity, be it through the activities of the Pan-African Parliament, the Peace and Security Council or the African court system are necessary requirements to accelerate the process of regional integration. African Union law will hold member states accountable to comply with international and continentally agreed standards on inter alia democracy, good governance and human rights

Composing security protocols: from confidentiality to privacy

Security protocols are used in many of our daily-life applications, and our privacy largely depends on their design. Formal verification techniques have proved their usefulness to analyse these protocols, but they become so complex that modular techniques have to be developed. We propose several results to safely compose security protocols. We consider arbitrary primitives modeled using an equational theory, and a rich process algebra close to the applied pi calculus. Relying on these composition results, we derive some security properties on a protocol from the security analysis performed on each of its sub-protocols individually. We consider parallel composition and the case of key-exchange protocols. Our results apply to deal with confidentiality but also privacy-type properties (e.g. anonymity) expressed using a notion of equivalence. We illustrate the usefulness of our composition results on protocols from the 3G phone application and electronic passport

Democracy, Ideology and Process Re-Engineering: Realising the Benefits of e-Government in Singapore

The re-engineering of governmental processes is a necessary condition for the realisation of the benefits of e-government. Several obstacles to such re-engineering exist. These include: (1) information processing thrives on transparency and amalgamation of data, whilst governments are constrained by principles of privacy and data separation; (2) top-down re-engineering may be resisted effectively from the bottom up. This paper analyses these obstacles in the way of re-engineering in Singapore – a democratic one-party state where legislative and executive power lies with the People’s Action Party – and considers how that hegemony has aided the development of e-government

Assessment of Haiti’s electricity sector

INTRODUCTION: This report summarizes the current state of the electricity sector in Haiti, to form a knowledge base from which to subsequently evaluate options for how best to increase electricity access in Haiti. Accordingly, this report summarizes the results of an extensive review of the publicly-available information on the electricity sector in Haiti, supplemented by targeted interviews with selected individuals known to be knowledgeable about electricity in Haiti based on their recent involvement in assessing the sector or in pursuing/supporting development opportunities. [TRUNCATED

Reconsidering the calculation and role of environmental footprints

Following the recent Copenhagen Climate Change conference, there has been discussion of the methods and underlying principles that inform climate change targets. Climate change targets following the Kyoto Protocol are broadly based on a production accounting principle (PAP). This approach focuses on emissions produced within given geographical boundaries. An alternative approach is a consumption accounting principle (CAP), where the focus is on emissions produced globally to meet consumption demand within the national (or regional) economy1. Increasingly popular environmental footprint measures, including ecological and carbon footprints, attempt to measure environmental impacts based on CAP methods. The perception that human consumption decisions lie at the heart of the climate change problem is the impetus driving pressure on policymakers for a more widespread use of CAP measures. At a global level of course, emissions accounted for under the production and consumption accounting principles would be equal. It is international trade that leads to differences in emissions under the two principles. This paper, the second in this special issue of the Fraser Commentary, examines how input-output accounting techniques may be applied to examine pollution generation under both of these accounting principles, focussing on waste and carbon generation in the Welsh economy as a case study. However, we take a different focus, arguing that the ‘domestic technology assumption’, taken as something of a mid-point in moving between production and consumption accounting in the first paper, may actually constitute a more useful focus for regional policymakers than full footprint analyses

The electricity generation mix in Scotland : the long and windy road?

This article reports on research funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) at the University of Strathclyde