A Formal Framework for Modeling Trust and Reputation in Collective Adaptive Systems

Trust and reputation models for distributed, collaborative systems have been studied and applied in several domains, in order to stimulate cooperation while preventing selfish and malicious behaviors. Nonetheless, such models have received less attention in the process of specifying and analyzing formally the functionalities of the systems mentioned above. The objective of this paper is to define a process algebraic framework for the modeling of systems that use (i) trust and reputation to govern the interactions among nodes, and (ii) communication models characterized by a high level of adaptiveness and flexibility. Hence, we propose a formalism for verifying, through model checking techniques, the robustness of these systems with respect to the typical attacks conducted against webs of trust.Comment: In Proceedings FORECAST 2016, arXiv:1607.0200

Covert Channel using Man-In-The-Middle over HTTPS

The goal of this covert channel is to prove the feasibility of using encrypted HTTPS traffic to carry a covert channel. The encryption key is not needed because the original HTTPS payload is not decrypted. The covert message will be appended to the HTTPS data field. The receiver will extract the covert channel and restore the original HTTPS traffic for forwarding. Only legitimate HTTPS connections will be used as the overt channel. A Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) attack at the sending and receiving ends will give access to modify the traffic streams. The HTTPS return traffic from the server can carry a covert channel. Without the original HTTPS traffic for comparison or the original encryption keys, this covert channel is undetectable

A novel intrusion detection system for internet of things devices and data

As we enter the new age of the Internet of Things (IoT) and wearable gadgets, sensors, and embedded devices are extensively used for data aggregation and its transmission. The extent of the data processed by IoT networks makes it vulnerable to outside attacks. Therefore, it is important to design an intrusion detection system (IDS) that ensures the security, integrity, and confidentiality of IoT networks and their data. State-of-the-art IDSs have poor detection capabilities and incur high communication and device overhead, which is not ideal for IoT applications requiring secured and real-time processing. This research presents a teaching-learning-based optimization enabled intrusion detection system (TLBO-IDS) which effectively protects IoT networks from intrusion attacks and also ensures low overhead at the same time. The proposed TLBO-IDS can detect analysis attacks, fuzzing attacks, shellcode attacks, worms, denial of service (Dos) attacks, exploits, and backdoor intrusion attacks. TLBO-IDS is extensively tested and its performance is compared with state-of-the-art algorithms. In particular, TLBO-IDS outperforms the bat algorithm and genetic algorithm (GA)

Performance Evaluations of Cryptographic Protocols Verification Tools Dealing with Algebraic Properties

International audienceThere exist several automatic verification tools of cryptographic protocols, but only few of them are able to check protocols in presence of algebraic properties. Most of these tools are dealing either with Exclusive-Or (XOR) and exponentiation properties, so-called Diffie-Hellman (DH). In the last few years, the number of these tools increased and some existing tools have been updated. Our aim is to compare their performances by analysing a selection of cryptographic protocols using XOR and DH. We compare execution time and memory consumption for different versions of the following tools OFMC, CL-Atse, Scyther, Tamarin, TA4SP, and extensions of ProVerif (XOR-ProVerif and DH-ProVerif). Our evaluation shows that in most of the cases the new versions of the tools are faster but consume more memory. We also show how the new tools: Tamarin, Scyther and TA4SP, can be compared to previous ones. We also discover and understand for the protocol IKEv2-DS a difference of modelling by the authors of different tools, which leads to different security results. Finally, for Exclusive-Or and Diffie-Hellman properties, we construct two families of protocols P xori and P dhi that allow us to clearly see for the first time the impact of the number of operators and variables in the tools' performances

A Comprehensive Security Architecture for Information Management throughout the Lifecycle of IoT Products

The Internet of things (IoT) is expected to have an impact on business and the world at large in a way comparable to the Internet itself. An IoT product is a physical product with an associated virtual counterpart connected to the internet with computational as well as communication capabilities. The possibility to collect information from internet-connected products and sensors gives unprecedented possibilities to improve and optimize product use and maintenance. Virtual counterpart and digital twin (DT) concepts have been proposed as a solution for providing the necessary information management throughout the whole product lifecycle, which we here call product lifecycle information management (PLIM). Security in these systems is imperative due to the multiple ways in which opponents can attack the system during the whole lifecycle of an IoT product. To address this need, the current study proposes a security architecture for the IoT, taking into particular consideration the requirements of PLIM. The security architecture has been designed for the Open Messaging Interface (O-MI) and Open Data Format (O-DF) standards for the IoT and product lifecycle management (PLM) but it is also applicable to other IoT and PLIM architectures. The proposed security architecture is capable of hindering unauthorized access to information and restricts access levels based on user roles and permissions. Based on our findings, the proposed security architecture is the first security model for PLIM to integrate and coordinate the IoT ecosystem, by dividing the security approaches into two domains: user client and product domain. The security architecture has been deployed in smart city use cases in three different European cities, Helsinki, Lyon, and Brussels, to validate the security metrics in the proposed approach. Our analysis shows that the proposed security architecture can easily integrate the security requirements of both clients and products providing solutions for them as demonstrated in the implemented use cases

Optimum parameter machine learning classification and prediction of Internet of Things (IoT) malwares using static malware analysis techniques

Application of machine learning in the field of malware analysis is not a new concept, there have been lots of researches done on the classification of malware in android and windows environments. However, when it comes to malware analysis in the internet of things (IoT), it still requires work to be done. IoT was not designed to keeping security/privacy under consideration. Therefore, this area is full of research challenges. This study seeks to evaluate important machine learning classifiers like Support Vector Machines, Neural Network, Random Forest, Decision Trees, Naive Bayes, Bayesian Network, etc. and proposes a framework to utilize static feature extraction and selection processes highlight issues like over-fitting and generalization of classifiers to get an optimized algorithm with better performance. For background study, we used systematic literature review to find out research gaps in IoT, presented malware as a big challenge for IoT and the reasons for applying malware analysis targeting IoT devices and finally perform classification on malware dataset. The classification process used was applied on three different datasets containing file header, program header and section headers as features. Preliminary results show the accuracy of over 90% on file header, program header, and section headers. The scope of this document just discusses these results as initial results and still require some issues to be addressed which may effect on the performance measures

Risks and potentials of graphical and gesture-based authentication for touchscreen mobile devices

While a few years ago, mobile phones were mainly used for making phone calls and texting short messages, the functionality of mobile devices has massively grown. We are surfing the web, sending emails and we are checking our bank accounts on the go. As a consequence, these internet-enabled devices store a lot of potentially sensitive data and require enhanced protection. We argue that authentication often represents the only countermeasure to protect mobile devices from unwanted access. Knowledge-based concepts (e.g., PIN) are the most used authentication schemes on mobile devices. They serve as the main protection barrier for many users and represent the fallback solution whenever alternative mechanisms fail (e.g., fingerprint recognition). This thesis focuses on the risks and potentials of gesture-based authentication concepts that particularly exploit the touch feature of mobile devices. The contribution of our work is threefold. Firstly, the problem space of mobile authentication is explored. Secondly, the design space is systematically evaluated utilizing interactive prototypes. Finally, we provide generalized insights into the impact of specific design factors and present recommendations for the design and the evaluation of graphical gesture-based authentication mechanisms. The problem space exploration is based on four research projects that reveal important real-world issues of gesture-based authentication on mobile devices. The first part focuses on authentication behavior in the wild and shows that the mobile context makes great demands on the usability of authentication concepts. The second part explores usability features of established concepts and indicates that gesture-based approaches have several benefits in the mobile context. The third part focuses on observability and presents a prediction model for the vulnerability of a given grid-based gesture. Finally, the fourth part investigates the predictability of user-selected gesture-based secrets. The design space exploration is based on a design-oriented research approach and presents several practical solutions to existing real-world problems. The novel authentication mechanisms are implemented into working prototypes and evaluated in the lab and the field. In the first part, we discuss smudge attacks and present alternative authentication concepts that are significantly more secure against such attacks. The second part focuses on observation attacks. We illustrate how relative touch gestures can support eyes-free authentication and how they can be utilized to make traditional PIN-entry secure against observation attacks. The third part addresses the problem of predictable gesture choice and presents two concepts which nudge users to select a more diverse set of gestures. Finally, the results of the basic research and the design-oriented applied research are combined to discuss the interconnection of design space and problem space. We contribute by outlining crucial requirements for mobile authentication mechanisms and present empirically proven objectives for future designs. In addition, we illustrate a systematic goal-oriented development process and provide recommendations for the evaluation of authentication on mobile devices.Während Mobiltelefone vor einigen Jahren noch fast ausschließlich zum Telefonieren und zum SMS schreiben genutzt wurden, sind die Anwendungsmöglichkeiten von Mobilgeräten in den letzten Jahren erheblich gewachsen. Wir surfen unterwegs im Netz, senden E-Mails und überprüfen Bankkonten. In der Folge speichern moderne internetfähigen Mobilgeräte eine Vielfalt potenziell sensibler Daten und erfordern einen erhöhten Schutz. In diesem Zusammenhang stellen Authentifizierungsmethoden häufig die einzige Möglichkeit dar, um Mobilgeräte vor ungewolltem Zugriff zu schützen. Wissensbasierte Konzepte (bspw. PIN) sind die meistgenutzten Authentifizierungssysteme auf Mobilgeräten. Sie stellen für viele Nutzer den einzigen Schutzmechanismus dar und dienen als Ersatzlösung, wenn alternative Systeme (bspw. Fingerabdruckerkennung) versagen. Diese Dissertation befasst sich mit den Risiken und Potenzialen gestenbasierter Konzepte, welche insbesondere die Touch-Funktion moderner Mobilgeräte ausschöpfen. Der wissenschaftliche Beitrag dieser Arbeit ist vielschichtig. Zum einen wird der Problemraum mobiler Authentifizierung erforscht. Zum anderen wird der Gestaltungsraum anhand interaktiver Prototypen systematisch evaluiert. Schließlich stellen wir generelle Einsichten bezüglich des Einflusses bestimmter Gestaltungsaspekte dar und geben Empfehlungen für die Gestaltung und Bewertung grafischer gestenbasierter Authentifizierungsmechanismen. Die Untersuchung des Problemraums basiert auf vier Forschungsprojekten, welche praktische Probleme gestenbasierter Authentifizierung offenbaren. Der erste Teil befasst sich mit dem Authentifizierungsverhalten im Alltag und zeigt, dass der mobile Kontext hohe Ansprüche an die Benutzerfreundlichkeit eines Authentifizierungssystems stellt. Der zweite Teil beschäftigt sich mit der Benutzerfreundlichkeit etablierter Methoden und deutet darauf hin, dass gestenbasierte Konzepte vor allem im mobilen Bereich besondere Vorzüge bieten. Im dritten Teil untersuchen wir die Beobachtbarkeit gestenbasierter Eingabe und präsentieren ein Vorhersagemodell, welches die Angreifbarkeit einer gegebenen rasterbasierten Geste abschätzt. Schließlich beschäftigen wir uns mit der Erratbarkeit nutzerselektierter Gesten. Die Untersuchung des Gestaltungsraums basiert auf einem gestaltungsorientierten Forschungsansatz, welcher zu mehreren praxisgerechte Lösungen führt. Die neuartigen Authentifizierungskonzepte werden als interaktive Prototypen umgesetzt und in Labor- und Feldversuchen evaluiert. Im ersten Teil diskutieren wir Fettfingerattacken ("smudge attacks") und präsentieren alternative Authentifizierungskonzepte, welche effektiv vor diesen Angriffen schützen. Der zweite Teil beschäftigt sich mit Angriffen durch Beobachtung und verdeutlicht wie relative Gesten dazu genutzt werden können, um blickfreie Authentifizierung zu gewährleisten oder um PIN-Eingaben vor Beobachtung zu schützen. Der dritte Teil beschäftigt sich mit dem Problem der vorhersehbaren Gestenwahl und präsentiert zwei Konzepte, welche Nutzer dazu bringen verschiedenartige Gesten zu wählen. Die Ergebnisse der Grundlagenforschung und der gestaltungsorientierten angewandten Forschung werden schließlich verknüpft, um die Verzahnung von Gestaltungsraum und Problemraum zu diskutieren. Wir präsentieren wichtige Anforderungen für mobile Authentifizierungsmechanismen und erläutern empirisch nachgewiesene Zielvorgaben für zukünftige Konzepte. Zusätzlich zeigen wir einen zielgerichteten Entwicklungsprozess auf, welcher bei der Entwicklung neuartiger Konzepte helfen wird und geben Empfehlungen für die Evaluation mobiler Authentifizierungsmethoden