Decision Making in the Context of Natural Disasters Based on a Geographic Information System and the Internet of Things (IoT)

Decisions within the company, managers in countries or regions are made by one or more groups of decision-makers. The management of natural disasters involves several specialized decision-makers (experts, firefighters, police officers, drivers,). The aim of the chapter is to improve decision making in the context of natural disasters situation. Zero risk in the world does not exist due to natural phenomena that occur randomly and appear suddenly. It is essential to manage the risks in the situation of natural disasters and also to confront the influence of natural disasters on the phenomenon of Soil-Structure Interaction. For this, this chapter presents a conceptual architecture of a knowledge base to manage the risks of natural disasters remotely by a Geographic Information system (GIS) and embedded systems. This architecture is based on the integration of data via different sources of information (GIS, satellites, electronic sensors and comments from experts). To properly manage this information, this chapter uses the ontology of Soil-Structure Interaction With Agents External (OSSIWAE) in the context of the Internet of Things (IoT). A case study is conducted on a prototype of a model for building a structure three-story for testing the usability of the proposed architecture

Big Data and the Internet of Things

Advances in sensing and computing capabilities are making it possible to embed increasing computing power in small devices. This has enabled the sensing devices not just to passively capture data at very high resolution but also to take sophisticated actions in response. Combined with advances in communication, this is resulting in an ecosystem of highly interconnected devices referred to as the Internet of Things - IoT. In conjunction, the advances in machine learning have allowed building models on this ever increasing amounts of data. Consequently, devices all the way from heavy assets such as aircraft engines to wearables such as health monitors can all now not only generate massive amounts of data but can draw back on aggregate analytics to "improve" their performance over time. Big data analytics has been identified as a key enabler for the IoT. In this chapter, we discuss various avenues of the IoT where big data analytics either is already making a significant impact or is on the cusp of doing so. We also discuss social implications and areas of concern.Comment: 33 pages. draft of upcoming book chapter in Japkowicz and Stefanowski (eds.) Big Data Analysis: New algorithms for a new society, Springer Series on Studies in Big Data, to appea

An Energy Aware and Secure MAC Protocol for Tackling Denial of Sleep Attacks in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks which form part of the core for the Internet of Things consist of resource constrained sensors that are usually powered by batteries. Therefore, careful energy awareness is essential when working with these devices. Indeed,the introduction of security techniques such as authentication and encryption, to ensure confidentiality and integrity of data, can place higher energy load on the sensors. However, the absence of security protection c ould give room for energy drain attacks such as denial of sleep attacks which have a higher negative impact on the life span ( of the sensors than the presence of security features. This thesis, therefore, focuses on tackling denial of sleep attacks from two perspectives A security perspective and an energy efficiency perspective. The security perspective involves evaluating and ranking a number of security based techniques to curbing denial of sleep attacks. The energy efficiency perspective, on the other hand, involves exploring duty cycling and simulating three Media Access Control ( protocols Sensor MAC, Timeout MAC andTunableMAC under different network sizes and measuring different parameters such as the Received Signal Strength RSSI) and Link Quality Indicator ( Transmit power, throughput and energy efficiency Duty cycling happens to be one of the major techniques for conserving energy in wireless sensor networks and this research aims to answer questions with regards to the effect of duty cycles on the energy efficiency as well as the throughput of three duty cycle protocols Sensor MAC ( Timeout MAC ( and TunableMAC in addition to creating a novel MAC protocol that is also more resilient to denial of sleep a ttacks than existing protocols. The main contributions to knowledge from this thesis are the developed framework used for evaluation of existing denial of sleep attack solutions and the algorithms which fuel the other contribution to knowledge a newly developed protocol tested on the Castalia Simulator on the OMNET++ platform. The new protocol has been compared with existing protocols and has been found to have significant improvement in energy efficiency and also better resilience to denial of sleep at tacks Part of this research has been published Two conference publications in IEEE Explore and one workshop paper

E-Health business models prototyping by incremental design

User-Driven Healthcare: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications provides a global discussion on the practice of user-driven learning in healthcare and connected disciplines and its influence on learning through clinical problem solving. This book brings together different perspectives for researchers and practitioners to develop a comprehensive framework of user-driven healthcare.Postprint (published version

TrusNet: Peer-to-Peer Cryptographic Authentication

Originally, the Internet was meant as a general purpose communication protocol, transferring primarily text documents between interested parties. Over time, documents expanded to include pictures, videos and even web pages. Increasingly, the Internet is being used to transfer a new kind of data which it was never designed for. In most ways, this new data type fits in naturally to the Internet, taking advantage of the near limit-less expanse of the protocol. Hardware protocols, unlike previous data types, provide a unique set security problem. Much like financial data, hardware protocols extended across the Internet must be protected with authentication. Currently, systems which do authenticate do so through a central server, utilizing a similar authentication model to the HTTPS protocol. This hierarchical model is often at odds with the needs of hardware protocols, particularly in ad-hoc networks where peer-to-peer communication is prioritized over a hierarchical model. Our project attempts to implement a peer-to-peer cryptographic authentication protocol to be used to protect hardware protocols extending over the Internet. The TrusNet project uses public-key cryptography to authenticate nodes on a distributed network, with each node locally managing a record of the public keys of nodes which it has encountered. These keys are used to secure data transmission between nodes and to authenticate the identities of nodes. TrusNet is designed to be used on multiple different types of network interfaces, but currently only has explicit hooks for Internet Protocol connections. As of June 2016, TrusNet has successfully achieved a basic authentication and communication protocol on Windows 7, OSX, Linux 14 and the Intel Edison. TrusNet uses RC-4 as its stream cipher and RSA as its public-key algorithm, although both of these are easily configurable. Along with the library, TrusNet also enables the building of a unit testing suite, a simple UI application designed to visualize the basics of the system and a build with hooks into the I/O pins of the Intel Edison allowing for a basic demonstration of the system

The New Grid

The New Grid seeks to provide mobile users with an additional method for off-grid communication, or communication without connection to Internet infrastructure. The motivation for this project was to find another alternative to Internet-dependent communication. Current Internet infrastructure is antiquated; it is expensive to maintain and expand, it has numerous vulnerabilities and high-impact points of failure, and can be rendered unusable for lengthy periods of time by natural disasters or other catastrophes. This current grid will eventually need to be replaced by a more modern, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure. The results of the projects research showed that implementing a library to allow for the creation of mobile peer-to-peer mesh networks could serve as a starting point for a transition from current Internet infrastructure to a more scalable, adaptive, and reliable Internet- independent network grid. Development of The New Grid largely followed the Rational Unified Process, in which the development process is split into four phases: requirements gathering, system design, implementation, and testing. Most of fall quarter was spent outlining functional requirements for the system, designing possible methods of implementation, and researching similar solutions that seek to transition mass mobile communication to a newer, more modern network grid. The New Grid differs from similar solutions because it has been implemented as a modular library. Current systems that allow for off-grid mobile connection exist as independent applications with a defined context and predetermined usability scope. We, the design team, found that implementing the system in the form of a modular library has multiple benefits. Primarily, this implementation would allow The New Grid to be deployed as widely as possible. Developers can both write applications around our library as well as include specific modules into existing applications without impacting other modules or introducing additional overhead into a system. Another benefit of deploying the system as a modular library is adaptability. The current, initial stable build of The New Grid uses Bluetooth Low Energy as its backbone for facilitating communication within large networks of mobile devices; however, this library could use any existing or future communication protocol to facilitate connection as long as a hook is written to allow The New Grid to interface with that protocol. Thus, The New Grid is not limited by which connection protocols currently exist, a property that other similar systems do not possess. The New Grid can be used in any application that requires connection between users. The most common applications would likely be messaging, file sharing, or social networking. While developers may find a variety of uses for The New Grid, its primary purpose is to facilitate reliable connection and secure data transfer in an environment with a large user base. Achieving this goal was proven feasible through research and testing the library with a small cluster of Android devices communicating solely with Bluetooth Low Energy. Expanding this group of a few phones to a larger mesh network of hundreds of devices was shown to be feasible through testing the librarys algorithms and protocols on a large network of virtual devices. As long as developers seek to create applications that allow users to communicate independent of Internet infrastructure, The New Grid will allow smartphone users to communicate off-grid and hopefully spur a switch from infrastructure-dependent mobile communication to user-centric, adaptive, and flexible connection

Addressing the Challenges in Federating Edge Resources

This book chapter considers how Edge deployments can be brought to bear in a global context by federating them across multiple geographic regions to create a global Edge-based fabric that decentralizes data center computation. This is currently impractical, not only because of technical challenges, but is also shrouded by social, legal and geopolitical issues. In this chapter, we discuss two key challenges - networking and management in federating Edge deployments. Additionally, we consider resource and modeling challenges that will need to be addressed for a federated Edge.Comment: Book Chapter accepted to the Fog and Edge Computing: Principles and Paradigms; Editors Buyya, Sriram

Pembangunan Modul Pengajaran Kendiri (MPK) keusahawanan dalam topik isu keusahawanan bagi pelajar diploma di politeknik

Terdapat pelbagai kaedah pembelajaran yang telah diperkenalkan termasuklah kaedah pembelajaran yang menggunakan pendekatan pembelajaran bermodul secara kendiri. Kajian ini adalah bertujuan untuk mengkaji kesesuaian Modul Pengajaran Kendiri Keusahawanan dalam topik Isu Keusahawanan yang telah dihasilkan bagi pelajar yang mengikuti pengajian Diploma di Jabatan Perdagangan Politeknik. Antara aspek yang dikaji ialah untuk menilai sama ada rekabentuk modul yang dihasilkan dapat memenuhi ciri-ciri modul yang baik, MPK yang dihasilkan dapat membantu mencapai objektif pembelajaran, MPK ini bersifat mesra pengguna dan MPK yang dihasilkan membantu pensyarah menyampaikan pengajarannya dengan lebih berkesan. Kajian ini dilakukan ke atas 110 orang pelajar semester en am yang mengikuti pengajian diploma dan 4 orang pensyarah yang mengajar subjek Keusahawanan di Jabatan Perdagangan Politeknik Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah, Selangor. Kaedah analisa data yang digunakan dalam kajian ini ialah skor min dan peratus. Hasil daripada kajian ini menunjukkan bahawa rekabentuk modul yang dihasilkan memenuhi ciri-ciri modul yang baik, MPK ini membantu untuk mencapai objektif pembelajaran, MPK ini bersifat mesra pengguna dan MPK yang dihasilkan dapat membantu pensyarah menyampaikan pengajarannya dengan lebih berkesan. Ini bermakna secara keseluruhannya, hasil kajian menunjukkan bahawa modul yang dihasilkan oleh pengkaji adalah sesuai digunakan oleh pelajar-pelajar semester enam yang mengikuti pengajian diploma di Jabatan Perdagangan peringkat politeknik. Seterusnya, beberapa pandangan telah dikemukakan bagi meningkatkan rnutu dan kualiti MPK yang dihasilkan. Semoga kajian ini dapat memberi manfaat kepada mereka yang terlibat dalam bidang pendidikan