LNCS

Generalized Selective Decryption (GSD), introduced by Panjwani [TCC’07], is a game for a symmetric encryption scheme Enc that captures the difficulty of proving adaptive security of certain protocols, most notably the Logical Key Hierarchy (LKH) multicast encryption protocol. In the GSD game there are n keys k1,..., kn, which the adversary may adaptively corrupt (learn); moreover, it can ask for encryptions Encki (kj) of keys under other keys. The adversary’s task is to distinguish keys (which it cannot trivially compute) from random. Proving the hardness of GSD assuming only IND-CPA security of Enc is surprisingly hard. Using “complexity leveraging” loses a factor exponential in n, which makes the proof practically meaningless. We can think of the GSD game as building a graph on n vertices, where we add an edge i → j when the adversary asks for an encryption of kj under ki. If restricted to graphs of depth ℓ, Panjwani gave a reduction that loses only a factor exponential in ℓ (not n). To date, this is the only non-trivial result known for GSD. In this paper we give almost-polynomial reductions for large classes of graphs. Most importantly, we prove the security of the GSD game restricted to trees losing only a quasi-polynomial factor n3 log n+5. Trees are an important special case capturing real-world protocols like the LKH protocol. Our new bound improves upon Panjwani’s on some LKH variants proposed in the literature where the underlying tree is not balanced. Our proof builds on ideas from the “nested hybrids” technique recently introduced by Fuchsbauer et al. [Asiacrypt’14] for proving the adaptive security of constrained PRFs

And it’s not history. It’s now : embedding a trauma framework into the practice of welfare practitioners who work with Aboriginal families in the NSW child protection sector

This thesis presents a coherent body of research that investigates the theories that underpin the practice of welfare practitioners working with Aboriginal people in the New South Wales child protection system, and explores the impact of a professional training program built on trauma theory. The forcible separation of Indigenous children from their families as the result of past government policy and assimilation laws resulted in collective, historical and intergenerational trauma, which is evident in Aboriginal communities today. The concept of trauma provides a framework that gives a name to, and a language that makes sense of, the experience of the Stolen Generations and their descendants. At its core is the requirement that the stories of Indigenous people be heard, understood and ultimately acknowledged as trauma. Without an understanding of the dynamics of collective, historical and intergenerational trauma and an ability to respond appropriately to it, even the most wellmeaning practitioner is at risk of continuing to perpetrate trauma on successive generations of Indigenous children and their families. To date, the notion of collective, historical and intergenerational trauma has been slow to gain traction in relation to Indigenous people forcibly removed and their descendants. Indigenous people continue to experience judgement and blame for their ongoing disadvantage. The absence of an alternative narrative that acknowledges the traumatic experiences of Indigenous Australians means that racist attitudes and behaviours remain embedded consciously and unconsciously in the dominant culture. The significant over-representation of Indigenous children in the child protection sector makes it imperative that welfare practitioners receive high quality, ongoing training to support appropriate child protection practice and develop relevant trauma informed interventions. There is an urgency to ensure that training is not just provided, but is provided in a way that improves knowledge, skills and understanding, is rigorously evaluated, and leads to improved practice

Caroline Chisholm, 1808-1877: ordinary woman - extraordinary life, impossible category

The purpose of this thesis is to look at the motivations behind the life and work of Caroline Chisholm, nee Jones, 1808-1877, and to ascertain why British historians have chosen to ignore her contribution to the nineteenth century emigration movement, while attending closely to such women as Nightingale for example. The Introduction to the thesis discusses the difficulties of writing a biography of a nineteenth century woman, who lived at the threshold of modernity, from the perspective of the twenty-first century, in the period identified as late modernity or postmodernity. The critical issues of writing a historical biography are explored. Chapter Two continues the debate in relation to the Sources, Methods and Problems that have been met with in writing the thesis. Chapters Three to Seven consider Chisholm's life and work in the more conventional narrative format, detailing where new evidence has been found. By showing where misinformation and errors have arisen in earlier biographies that have been perpetuated by subsequent biographies, they give specificity to the debate discussed in the Introduction. Chapters Eight to Ten discuss, in far greater depth than a conventional narrative format allows, the relevant political, religious and social influences which shaped and influenced Chisholm's life, and which facilitate an understanding of her motivation and character

Strategic Human Resource Management and Employment Relations : An International Perspective

he theoretical roots for the study of human resource management (HRM) in organisations have existed in the Western contexts for over a century when seminal ideas of influential management thinkers such as Taylor, Drucker and McGregor were in prevalence. Earlier conceptualisations of work and employment adopted a different (pluralist) emphases and focused on terms such as labour welfare, labour relations, personnel management and industrial relations to name a few. One could argue, this view reflected contemporary developments in the field of HRM, albeit with different ideological and philosophical focus that have been in operation for several centuries. For example, in India, work practices were influenced by the ancient ideas of Chanakya (also referred to as Kautilya), whose pioneering work on Arthashastra was regarded as a treatise in the field of economics, politics, military strategy and governance. This seminal work had also developed ideas of organisation and administration in the fourth century BC. Indeed, one only needs to turn back and look at the practices of one of the world’s oldest multinational corporation–the erstwhile East India Company, which was founded in the early 1600 in India by the British to pursue trade with the East Indies. Even though it ended up trading, in the main, in the Indian subcontinent, its operations spanned across several borders

Enhancing Privacy Protection:Set Membership, Range Proofs, and the Extended Access Control

Privacy has recently gained an importance beyond the field of cryptography. In that regard, the main goal behind this thesis is to enhance privacy protection. All of the necessary mathematical and cryptographic preliminaries are introduced at the start of this thesis. We then show in Part I how to improve set membership and range proofs, which are cryptographic primitives enabling better privacy protection. Part II shows how to improve the standards for Machine Readable Travel Documents (MRTDs), such as biometric passports. Regarding set membership proofs, we provide an efficient protocol based on the Boneh-Boyen signature scheme. We show that alternative signature schemes can be used and we provide a general protocol description that can be applied for any secure signature scheme. We also show that signature schemes in our design can be replaced by cryptographic accumulators. For range proofs, we provide interactive solutions where the range is divided in a base u and the u-ary digits are handled by one of our set membership proofs. A general construction is also provided for any set membership proof. We additionally explain how to handle arbitrary ranges with either two range proofs or with an improved solution based on sumset representation. These efficient solutions achieve, to date, the lowest asymptotical communication load. Furthermore, this thesis shows that the first efficient non-interactive range proof is insecure. This thesis thus provides the first efficient and secure non-interactive range proof. In the case of MRTDs, two standards exist: one produced by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the other by the European Union, which is called the Extended Access Control (EAC). Although this thesis focuses on the EAC, which is supposed to solve all privacy concerns, it shows that both standards fail to provide complete privacy protection. Lastly, we provide several solutions to improve them

Actas de la XIII Reunión Española sobre Criptología y Seguridad de la Información RECSI XIII : Alicante, 2-5 de septiembre de 2014

Si tuviéramos que elegir un conjunto de palabras clave para definir la sociedad actual, sin duda el término información sería uno de los más representativos. Vivimos en un mundo caracterizado por un continuo flujo de información en el que las Tecnologías de la Información y Comunicación (TIC) y las Redes Sociales desempeñan un papel relevante. En la Sociedad de la Información se generan gran variedad de datos en formato digital, siendo la protección de los mismos frente a accesos y usos no autorizados el objetivo principal de lo que conocemos como Seguridad de la Información. Si bien la Criptología es una herramienta tecnológica básica, dedicada al desarrollo y análisis de sistemas y protocolos que garanticen la seguridad de los datos, el espectro de tecnologías que intervienen en la protección de la información es amplio y abarca diferentes disciplinas. Una de las características de esta ciencia es su rápida y constante evolución, motivada en parte por los continuos avances que se producen en el terreno de la computación, especialmente en las últimas décadas. Sistemas, protocolos y herramientas en general considerados seguros en la actualidad dejarán de serlo en un futuro más o menos cercano, lo que hace imprescindible el desarrollo de nuevas herramientas que garanticen, de forma eficiente, los necesarios niveles de seguridad. La Reunión Española sobre Criptología y Seguridad de la Información (RECSI) es el congreso científico español de referencia en el ámbito de la Criptología y la Seguridad en las TIC, en el que se dan cita periódicamente los principales investigadores españoles y de otras nacionalidades en esta disciplina, con el fin de compartir los resultados más recientes de su investigación. Del 2 al 5 de septiembre de 2014 se celebrará la decimotercera edición en la ciudad de Alicante, organizada por el grupo de Criptología y Seguridad Computacional de la Universidad de Alicante. Las anteriores ediciones tuvieron lugar en Palma de Mallorca (1991), Madrid (1992), Barcelona (1994), Valladolid (1996), Torremolinos (1998), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (2000), Oviedo (2002), Leganés (2004), Barcelona (2006), Salamanca (2008), Tarragona (2010) y San Sebastián (2012)