Conscript Your Friends into Larger Anonymity Sets with JavaScript

We present the design and prototype implementation of ConScript, a framework for using JavaScript to allow casual Web users to participate in an anonymous communication system. When a Web user visits a cooperative Web site, the site serves a JavaScript application that instructs the browser to create and submit "dummy" messages into the anonymity system. Users who want to send non-dummy messages through the anonymity system use a browser plug-in to replace these dummy messages with real messages. Creating such conscripted anonymity sets can increase the anonymity set size available to users of remailer, e-voting, and verifiable shuffle-style anonymity systems. We outline ConScript's architecture, we address a number of potential attacks against ConScript, and we discuss the ethical issues related to deploying such a system. Our implementation results demonstrate the practicality of ConScript: a workstation running our ConScript prototype JavaScript client generates a dummy message for a mix-net in 81 milliseconds and it generates a dummy message for a DoS-resistant DC-net in 156 milliseconds.Comment: An abbreviated version of this paper will appear at the WPES 2013 worksho

Principles of Security and Trust: 7th International Conference, POST 2018, Held as Part of the European Joint Conferences on Theory and Practice of Software, ETAPS 2018, Thessaloniki, Greece, April 14-20, 2018, Proceedings

authentication; computer science; computer software selection and evaluation; cryptography; data privacy; formal logic; formal methods; formal specification; internet; privacy; program compilers; programming languages; security analysis; security systems; semantics; separation logic; software engineering; specifications; verification; world wide we

Vox ex machina : towards a digital poetics of the disembodied voice

This thesis explores the notion of ‘voice’ in relation to contemporary poetics and the digital arts. It is a practice-based project that produces a theoretical and creative space in which a theory of the ‘voice of the machine’ is discovered and tested. Through a series of research chapters and critical reflections this thesis tests ideas of dictation, translation, inscription and embodiment using the poetic device of the disembodied — or acousmatic — voice as a fundamental theoretical framework, which in turn informs my practice. I begin with a study of Jack Spicer’s book After Lorca, a collection of translated poems that are dictated to Spicer by the ghost of Federico García Lorca. Using the work of Mladen Dolar, I explore the idea of the acousmatic voice and the processes of translation that emerge from this when one is in communion with the dead. From this I identify a ‘network of tradition’: Spicer’s matrix of historical, poetic associations to which belongs W.B. Yeats, another poet who used spirit dictation in composition. I focus on the practice of Yeats’s wife, George, who, acting as a medium, produced hundreds of manuscripts of automatic writing and drawing. Through a study of Johanna Drucker’s notion of graphesis, via discussions on choreography, I establish George Yeats as a spiritual writing machine whose practice works as an acoustic register of ghostly dictation and audition. I consider the idea of katabasis — an Orphic descent to retrieve a voice — that underpins Spicer’s poetics in After Lorca and I use this as a catalyst to enact gestures of archival katabasis — in pursuit of George Yeats — and what I term as the kata_BASIC, which is a descent into the machine to retrieve its voice. Using the random-chance poetics of Jackson Mac Low as a practice methodology I understand the voice of the machine to be an expression of its agency and computational processes, which are materialised in machine-mediated interventions such as the glitch. The practice I produce in this project — poetry, objects, video and sound — tests ideas of translation, acoustic imagery, hybridity and transcreation in light of the idea of a shared voice of collaboration that exists between the machine and the archived or disembodied voices that it (re)mediates

Cyber Analogies

This anthology of cyber analogies will resonate with readers whose duties call for them to set strategies to protect the virtual domain and determine the policies that govern it. Our belief is that learning is most effective when concepts under consideration can be aligned with already-existing understanding or knowledge. Cyber issues are inherently tough to explain in layman's terms. The future is always open and undetermined, and the numbers of actors and the complexity of their relations are too great to give definitive guidance about future developments. In this respect, historical analogies, carefully developed and properly applied, help indicate a direction for action by reducing complexity and making the future at least cognately manageable.US Cyber CommandIntroduction: Emily O. Goldman & John Arquilla; The Cyber Pearl Harbor:James J. Wirtz: Applying the Historical Lessons of Surprise Attack to the Cyber Domain: The Example of the United Kingdom:Dr Michael S. Goodman: The Cyber Pearl Harbor Analogy: An Attacker’s Perspective: Emily O. Goldman, John Surdu, & Michael Warner: “When the Urgency of Time and Circumstances Clearly Does Not Permit...”: Redelegation in Nuclear and Cyber Scenarios: Peter Feaver & Kenneth Geers; Comparing Airpower and Cyberpower: Dr. Gregory Rattray: Active Cyber Defense: Applying Air Defense to the Cyber Domain: Dorothy E. Denning & Bradley J. Strawser: The Strategy of Economic Warfare: A Historical Case Study and Possible Analogy to: Contemporary Cyber Warfare: Nicholas A. Lambert: Silicon Valley: Metaphor for Cybersecurity, Key to Understanding Innovation War: John Kao: The Offense-Defense Balance and Cyber Warfare: Keir Lieber: A Repertory of Cyber Analogies: Robert Axelro

Vox ex machina : towards a digital poetics of the disembodied voice

This thesis explores the notion of ‘voice’ in relation to contemporary poetics and the digital arts. It is a practice-based project that produces a theoretical and creative space in which a theory of the ‘voice of the machine’ is discovered and tested. Through a series of research chapters and critical reflections this thesis tests ideas of dictation, translation, inscription and embodiment using the poetic device of the disembodied — or acousmatic — voice as a fundamental theoretical framework, which in turn informs my practice. I begin with a study of Jack Spicer’s book After Lorca, a collection of translated poems that are dictated to Spicer by the ghost of Federico García Lorca. Using the work of Mladen Dolar, I explore the idea of the acousmatic voice and the processes of translation that emerge from this when one is in communion with the dead. From this I identify a ‘network of tradition’: Spicer’s matrix of historical, poetic associations to which belongs W.B. Yeats, another poet who used spirit dictation in composition. I focus on the practice of Yeats’s wife, George, who, acting as a medium, produced hundreds of manuscripts of automatic writing and drawing. Through a study of Johanna Drucker’s notion of graphesis, via discussions on choreography, I establish George Yeats as a spiritual writing machine whose practice works as an acoustic register of ghostly dictation and audition. I consider the idea of katabasis — an Orphic descent to retrieve a voice — that underpins Spicer’s poetics in After Lorca and I use this as a catalyst to enact gestures of archival katabasis — in pursuit of George Yeats — and what I term as the kata_BASIC, which is a descent into the machine to retrieve its voice. Using the random-chance poetics of Jackson Mac Low as a practice methodology I understand the voice of the machine to be an expression of its agency and computational processes, which are materialised in machine-mediated interventions such as the glitch. The practice I produce in this project — poetry, objects, video and sound — tests ideas of translation, acoustic imagery, hybridity and transcreation in light of the idea of a shared voice of collaboration that exists between the machine and the archived or disembodied voices that it (re)mediates

Building experiences - a reflective design process for media architecture

Media Architecture design, although visually prominent and involving interdisciplinary collaboration, rarely succeeds in creating urban situations of contextual relevance beyond temporary effects. This research understands Media Architecture as a communication medium and proposes the need to engage with its multi-stakeholder audience from early on in the conceptual design stage. This practice-led design research presents a broad critical investigation into the emerging field of Media Architecture (Jaschko & Sauter 2006; Foth 2008; Haeusler 2009) spanning conceptions of media space, experience, participation and design as discourse (Scollon & Scollon 2003; Fatah gen. Schieck 2006). Its findings contribute a new perspective on Media Architecture as experiential visual design process, based on an analysis of design methods, principles of participatory design and reflection, as well as an overview and classification of Media Architecture practice. Following a related literature review, the thesis identified experiential learning and the notion of troublesome knowledge (Meyer & Land 2003; Perkins 1999) as a distinguishable new perspective on design for Media Architecture. By connecting exploratory and generative design research tools (i.e., interviews, collaborative expert workshops, visual prototyping) with theoretical constructs of learning theory (Schön 1983; Kolb 1983), experience (McCarthy & Wright 2004) and ownership in urban design (McDonnell 2009; Townsend 2013; Lange & Waal 2013), this thesis developed an experimental design methodology for stakeholder involvement in Media Architecture. An iterative review and reflection process led to methods evolving from initial research tools for analysis to self-reflective design process outcomes. The findings of this study were used to create the Media Architecture Archive (MAA), a digital participatory database using a comprehensive classification system of Media Architecture practice. It is complemented by an experiential method framework based on visual design for contextual research, envisioning and prototyping in Media Architecture. Thus, the research contributes a novel approach to visual communication in Media Architecture, by applying visual design to encourage stakeholder involvement, discourse and reflection at early stages in the design process. The self-reflective structure of the study contributes to our knowledge of how practice-led learning processes applied through visual communication can serve as an extension of the Media Architecture experience as both process and outcome

Online courses for healthcare professionals: is there a role for social learning?

Background: All UK postgraduate medical trainees receive supervision from trained supervisors. Training has traditionally been delivered via face to face courses, but with increasing time pressures and complex shift patterns, access to these is difficult. To meet this challenge, we developed a two-week massive open online course (MOOC) for faculty development of clinical supervisors. Summary of Work: The MOOC was developed by a group of experienced medical educators and delivered via the FutureLearn (FL) platform which promotes social learning through interaction. This facilitates building of communities of practice, learner interaction and collaboration. We explored learner perceptions of the course, in particular the value of social learning in the context of busy healthcare professionals. We analysed responses to pre- and post-course surveys for each run of the MOOC in 2015, FL course statistics, and learner discussion board comments. Summary of Results: Over 2015, 7,225 learners registered for the course, though 6% left the course without starting. Of the 3,055 learners who began the course, 35% (1073/3055) were social learners who interacted with other participants. Around 31% (960/3055) learners participated fully in the course; this is significantly higher than the FL average of 22%. Survey responses suggest that 68% learners worked full-time, with over 75% accessing the course at home or while commuting, using laptops, smart phones and tablet devices. Discussion: Learners found the course very accessible due to the bite-sized videos, animations, etc which were manageable at the end of a busy working day. Inter-professional discussions and social learning made the learning environment more engaging. Discussion were rated as high quality as they facilitated sharing of narratives and personal reflections, as well as relevant resources. Conclusion: Social learning added value to the course by promoting sharing of resources and improved interaction between learners within the online environment. Take Home Messages: 1) MOOCs can provide faculty development efficiently with a few caveats. 2) Social learning added a new dimension to the online environment