The Legacy of Ronald Dworkin (1931-2013): A Legal Theory and Methodology for Hedgehogs, Hercules, and One Right Answers

In this paper the author addresses Ronald Dworkin’s work and assesses his legacy to legal, moral and political philosophy. And so, considers among its merits having developed an original legal theory with its distinctive methodology, which not only has transcended the Natural Law and Legal Positivism dichotomy, but also has reintegrated law into a branch of political morality and defended as a corollary the one right answer thesis. Hence, commences by identifying the dworkininan challenge; continues by introducing some basic definitions and distinctions between jurisprudence, legal philosophy (or philosophy of law) and legal theory (or theory of law), on the one hand, and its relationship to methodology, on the other hand; later by pointing out the main methodologies available to legal theories, following the distinctions between descriptive and prescriptive or normative, on one side, and, general and particular, on the other; then by revisiting Dworkin’s model, which he characterizes as constructive, interpretive (and even argumentative), evaluative and integrative; and, concludes by reconsidering in this light the one right answer thesis

Automated Analysis of ARM Binaries using the Low-Level Virtual Machine Compiler Framework

Binary program analysis is a critical capability for offensive and defensive operations in Cyberspace. However, many current techniques are ineffective or time-consuming and few tools can analyze code compiled for embedded processors such as those used in network interface cards, control systems and mobile phones. This research designs and implements a binary analysis system, called the Architecture-independent Binary Abstracting Code Analysis System (ABACAS), which reverses the normal program compilation process, lifting binary machine code to the Low-Level Virtual Machine (LLVM) compiler\u27s intermediate representation, thereby enabling existing security-related analyses to be applied to binary programs. The prototype targets ARM binaries but can be extended to support other architectures. Several programs are translated from ARM binaries and analyzed with existing analysis tools. Programs lifted from ARM binaries are an average of 3.73 times larger than the same programs compiled from a high-level language (HLL). Analysis results are equivalent regardless of whether the HLL source or ARM binary version of the program is submitted to the system, confirming the hypothesis that LLVM is effective for binary analysis

Cooperative intrusion detection for the next generation carrier: ethernet

Tese de mestrado em Informática, apresentada à Universidade de Lisboa, através da Faculdade de Ciências, 2007Hoje em dia os elementos de rede (NEs) da camada 2 do modelo OSI, bridges ou switches, são componentes complexos, com centenas de milhares de linhas de código, que podem ser vulneráveis a ataques, permitindo até a execçuão remota de código. Este trabalho tem como objectivo a criação de um sistema para proteger infra-estruturas de rede Carrier Ethernet de ataques lançados por NEs maliciosos contra o protocolo de gestão de ligações, o Spanning Tree Protocol, e as sua variantes. Na tese é proposto que os NEs sejam equipados com um componente de detecção de intrusões. Cada um dos detectores utiliza um mecanismo da detecção de intrusões baseada em especificacão e inspecciona o comportamento dos outros NEs através da análise das mensagens recebidas. O comportamento correcto dos NEs é descrito tendo em conta a especificação normalizada do protocolo STP. Se existir um desvio entre um comportamento esperado e o actual, o NE é suspeito de ser malicioso. A especificação é estendida com anotações de padrões temporais, de modo a detectar desvios do protocolo por parte dos NEs localmente. Os resultados da detecção local nos NEs são enviados para os outros, para que todos possam correlacionar a informação da detecção, diagnosticar quais são os NEs maliciosos e logicamente removê-los da rede, desligando todas as portas a eles ligadas.Current OSI model layer 2 network elements (NEs, e.g., bridges, switches) are complex hardware and software boxes, often running an operating system, service and administration software, that can be vulnerable to attacks, including to remote code execution inside them. The purpose of this thesis is to present an architecture to protect the Carrier Ethernet network infrastructure from attacks performed by malicious NEs against the link management protocol, Spanning Tree Protocol, and its variations. This thesis proposes that NEs are equipped with an intrusion detection component. Each detector uses a specification-based intrusion detection mechanism in order to inspect the behaviour of other NEs through the analysis of the received messages. The correct behaviour of the NEs is crafted from the standard specification of the STP protocol. If there is a deviation between current and expected behaviour, then the NE is considered to be malicious. The specification is extended with temporal pattern annotations, in order to detect certain deviations from the protocol. The results of the local detection are then transmitted to the other NEs, in order to cooperatively establish a correlation between all the NEs, so that malicious NEs can be logically removed from the network (disconnecting the ports connected to them)

Probabilistic basis and assessment methodology for effectiveness of protecting nuclear materials

textSafeguards and security (S&S) systems for nuclear facilities include material control and accounting (MC&A) and a physical protection system (PPS) to protect nuclear materials from theft, sabotage and other malevolent human acts. The PPS for a facility is evaluated using probabilistic analysis of adversary paths on the basis of detection, delay, and response timelines to determine timely detection. The path analysis methodology focuses on systematic, quantitative evaluation of the physical protection component for potential external threats, and often calculates the probability that the PPS is effective (PE) in defeating an adversary who uses that attack path. By monitoring and tracking critical materials, MC&A activities provide additional protection against inside adversaries, but have been difficult to characterize in ways that are compatible with the existing path analysis methods that are used to systematically evaluate the effectiveness of a site’s protection system. This research describes and demonstrates a new method to incorporate MC&A protection elements explicitly within the existing probabilistic path analysis methodology. MC&A activities, from monitoring to inventory measurements, provide many, often recurring opportunities to determine the status of critical items, including detection of missing materials. Human reliability analysis methods are applied to determine human error probabilities to characterize the detection capabilities of MC&A activities. An object-based state machine paradigm was developed to characterize the path elements and timing of an insider theft scenario as a race against MC&A activities that can move a facility from a normal state to a heightened alert state having additional detection opportunities. This paradigm is coupled with nuclear power plant probabilistic risk assessment techniques to incorporate the evaluation of MC&A activities in the existing path analysis methodology. Event sequence diagrams describe insider paths through the PPS and also incorporate MC&A activities as path elements. This work establishes a probabilistic basis for incorporating MC&A activities explicitly within the existing path analysis methodology to extend it to address insider threats. The analysis results for this new method provide an integrated effectiveness measure for a safeguards and security system that addresses threats from both outside and inside adversaries.Mechanical Engineerin

Spartan Daily, February 9, 1995

Volume 104, Issue 10https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/spartandaily/8655/thumbnail.jp

Curves, codes, and cryptography

This thesis deals with two topics: elliptic-curve cryptography and code-based cryptography. In 2007 elliptic-curve cryptography received a boost from the introduction of a new way of representing elliptic curves. Edwards, generalizing an example from Euler and Gauss, presented an addition law for the curves x2 + y2 = c2(1 + x2y2) over non-binary fields. Edwards showed that every elliptic curve can be expressed in this form as long as the underlying field is algebraically closed. Bernstein and Lange found fast explicit formulas for addition and doubling in coordinates (X : Y : Z) representing (x, y) = (X/Z, Y/Z) on these curves, and showed that these explicit formulas save time in elliptic-curve cryptography. It is easy to see that all of these curves are isomorphic to curves x2 + y2 = 1 + dx2y2 which now are called "Edwards curves" and whose shape covers considerably more elliptic curves over a finite field than x2 + y2 = c2(1 + x2y2). In this thesis the Edwards addition law is generalized to cover all curves ax2 +y2 = 1+dx2y2 which now are called "twisted Edwards curves." The fast explicit formulas for addition and doubling presented here are almost as fast in the general case as they are for the special case a = 1. This generalization brings the speed of the Edwards addition law to every Montgomery curve. Tripling formulas for Edwards curves can be used for double-base scalar multiplication where a multiple of a point is computed using a series of additions, doublings, and triplings. The use of double-base chains for elliptic-curve scalar multiplication for elliptic curves in various shapes is investigated in this thesis. It turns out that not only are Edwards curves among the fastest curve shapes, but also that the speed of doublings on Edwards curves renders double bases obsolete for this curve shape. Elliptic curves in Edwards form and twisted Edwards form can be used to speed up the Elliptic-Curve Method for integer factorization (ECM). We show how to construct elliptic curves in Edwards form and twisted Edwards form with large torsion groups which are used by the EECM-MPFQ implementation of ECM. Code-based cryptography was invented by McEliece in 1978. The McEliece public-key cryptosystem uses as public key a hidden Goppa code over a finite field. Encryption in McEliece’s system is remarkably fast (a matrix-vector multiplication). This system is rarely used in implementations. The main complaint is that the public key is too large. The McEliece cryptosystem recently regained attention with the advent of post-quantum cryptography, a new field in cryptography which deals with public-key systems without (known) vulnerabilities to attacks by quantum computers. The McEliece cryptosystem is one of them. In this thesis we underline the strength of the McEliece cryptosystem by improving attacks against it and by coming up with smaller-key variants. McEliece proposed to use binary Goppa codes. For these codes the most effective attacks rely on information-set decoding. In this thesis we present an attack developed together with Daniel J. Bernstein and Tanja Lange which uses and improves Stern’s idea of collision decoding. This attack is faster by a factor of more than 150 than previous attacks, bringing it within reach of a moderate computer cluster. We were able to extract a plaintext from a ciphertext by decoding 50 errors in a [1024, 524] binary code. The attack should not be interpreted as destroying the McEliece cryptosystem. However, the attack demonstrates that the original parameters were chosen too small. Building on this work the collision-decoding algorithm is generalized in two directions. First, we generalize the improved collision-decoding algorithm for codes over arbitrary fields and give a precise analysis of the running time. We use the analysis to propose parameters for the McEliece cryptosystem with Goppa codes over fields such as F31. Second, collision decoding is generalized to ball-collision decoding in the case of binary linear codes. Ball-collision decoding is asymptotically faster than any previous attack against the McEliece cryptosystem. Another way to strengthen the system is to use codes with a larger error-correction capability. This thesis presents "wild Goppa codes" which contain the classical binary Goppa codes as a special case. We explain how to encrypt and decrypt messages in the McEliece cryptosystem when using wild Goppa codes. The size of the public key can be reduced by using wild Goppa codes over moderate fields which is explained by evaluating the security of the "Wild McEliece" cryptosystem against our generalized collision attack for codes over finite fields. Code-based cryptography not only deals with public-key cryptography: a code-based hash function "FSB"was submitted to NIST’s SHA-3 competition, a competition to establish a new standard for cryptographic hashing. Wagner’s generalized birthday attack is a generic attack which can be used to find collisions in the compression function of FSB. However, applying Wagner’s algorithm is a challenge in storage-restricted environments. The FSBday project showed how to successfully mount the generalized birthday attack on 8 nodes of the Coding and Cryptography Computer Cluster (CCCC) at Technische Universiteit Eindhoven to find collisions in the toy version FSB48 which is contained in the submission to NIST