The Value of User-Visible Internet Cryptography

Cryptographic mechanisms are used in a wide range of applications, including email clients, web browsers, document and asset management systems, where typical users are not cryptography experts. A number of empirical studies have demonstrated that explicit, user-visible cryptographic mechanisms are not widely used by non-expert users, and as a result arguments have been made that cryptographic mechanisms need to be better hidden or embedded in end-user processes and tools. Other mechanisms, such as HTTPS, have cryptography built-in and only become visible to the user when a dialogue appears due to a (potential) problem. This paper surveys deployed and potential technologies in use, examines the social and legal context of broad classes of users, and from there, assesses the value and issues for those users

Embedding Web-based Statistical Translation Models in Cross-Language Information Retrieval

Although more and more language pairs are covered by machine translation services, there are still many pairs that lack translation resources. Cross-language information retrieval (CLIR) is an application which needs translation functionality of a relatively low level of sophistication since current models for information retrieval (IR) are still based on a bag-of-words. The Web provides a vast resource for the automatic construction of parallel corpora which can be used to train statistical translation models automatically. The resulting translation models can be embedded in several ways in a retrieval model. In this paper, we will investigate the problem of automatically mining parallel texts from the Web and different ways of integrating the translation models within the retrieval process. Our experiments on standard test collections for CLIR show that the Web-based translation models can surpass commercial MT systems in CLIR tasks. These results open the perspective of constructing a fully automatic query translation device for CLIR at a very low cost.Comment: 37 page

Disaster Risk Reduction in the Built Environment in Sri Lanka- An overview

Natural disasters have long-term implications on sustainable development. They mainly destroy the built environment thereby hindering economic and social development, and causing environment degradation. Reducing the risk of natural disasters within the built environment is therefore critical for ensuring sustainable development. The paper in this context, aims to assess the current state of disaster risk reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka. Empirical data was collected employing semi-structured in-depth interviews which were conducted with a group of professionals who were involved in disaster risk reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka. The data was analysed following thematic analysis. The paper reveals the current state of disaster risk reduction in the built environment requires to be improved to achieve a satisfactory level of success whilst highlighting a number of barriers that hinder the desired progress. Deficient funds and weak regulatory framework are identified as major barriers for successful implementation. Central and local government authorities are identified as the primarily responsible parties for disaster risk reduction in the built environment in Sri Lanka in the paper. The paper further presents various recommendations on how to improve the current situation