P3P semantic checker of site behaviours

The interactive use of the web between users and service providers introduces a privacy problem that involves the undesired disclosing of user personal information, mainly with the presence of personalization that needs this type of information. Also there are many manners to face it, but the Platform for Privacy Preferences (P3P) is one that provides a variable level of privacy for the user’s browsing. However, the P3P only introduces a privacy contract between the site and the user, without guarantees that it will be obeyed by the site. Then a semantic checker can be added to the P3P architecture to compare the contract with the site attitude and to increase the trustworthiness on the P3P contract. Some experiments are accomplished and the results are displayed to show the present situation of the privacy policies of the sites, and we discuss what it implies in the data gathering and what is gained with the use of the semantic checker.5th IFIP International Conference on Network Control & Engineering for QoS, Security and MobilityRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Privacy, security, and trust issues in smart environments

Recent advances in networking, handheld computing and sensor technologies have driven forward research towards the realisation of Mark Weiser's dream of calm and ubiquitous computing (variously called pervasive computing, ambient computing, active spaces, the disappearing computer or context-aware computing). In turn, this has led to the emergence of smart environments as one significant facet of research in this domain. A smart environment, or space, is a region of the real world that is extensively equipped with sensors, actuators and computing components [1]. In effect the smart space becomes a part of a larger information system: with all actions within the space potentially affecting the underlying computer applications, which may themselves affect the space through the actuators. Such smart environments have tremendous potential within many application areas to improve the utility of a space. Consider the potential offered by a smart environment that prolongs the time an elderly or infirm person can live an independent life or the potential offered by a smart environment that supports vicarious learning

Privacy trust access control infrastructure using XACML

The use of personal, sensitive information, such as privileges and attributes, to gain access to computer resources in distributed environments raises an interesting paradox. On one hand, in order to make the services and resources accessible to legitimate users, access control infrastructure requires valid and provable service clients' identities or attributes to make decisions. On the other hand, the service clients may not be prepared to disclose their identity information or attributes to a remote party without determining in advance whether the service provider can be trusted with such sensitive information. Moreover, when clients give out personal information, they still are unsure of the extent of propagation and use of the information. This thesis describes an investigation of privacy preserving options in access control infrastructures, and proposes a security model to support the management of those options, based on extensible Access Control Markup Language (XACML) and Security Access Markup Language (SAML), both of which are OASIS security standards. Existing access control systems are typically unilateral in that the enterprise service provider assigns the access rights and makes the access control decisions, and there is no negotiation between the client and the service provider. As access control management systems lean towards being user-centric or federated, unilateral approaches can no longer adequately preserve the client's privacy, particularly where communicating parties have no pre-existing trust relationship. As a result, a unified approach that significantly improves privacy and confidentiality protection in distributed environments was considered. This resulted in the development of XACML Trust Management Authorization Infrastructure (XTMAI) designed to handle privacy and confidentiality mutually and simultaneously using the concept of Obligation of Trust (OoT) protocol. The OoT enables two or more transaction parties to exchange Notice of Obligations (NoB) (obligating constraints) as well as Signed Acceptance of Obligation (SAO), a proof of acceptance, as security assurances before exchange of sensitive resources.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Enhancing user's privacy : developing a model for managing and testing the lifecycle of consent and revocation

Increasingly, people turn to the Internet for access to services, which often require disclosure of a significant amount of personal data. Networked technologies have enabled an explosive growth in the collection, storage and processing of personal information with notable commercial potential. However, there are asymmetries in relation to how people are able to control their own information when handled by enterprises. This raises significant privacy concerns and increases the risk of privacy breaches, thus creating an imperative need for mechanisms offering information control functionalities. To address the lack of controls in online environments, this thesis focuses on consent and revocation mechanisms to introduce a novel approach for controlling the collection, usage and dissemination of personal data and managing privacy ex- pectations. Drawing on an extensive multidisciplinary review on privacy and on empirical data from focus groups, this research presents a mathematical logic as the foundation for the management of consent and revocation controls in technological systems. More specifically, this work proposes a comprehensive conceptual model for con- sent and revocation and introduces the notion of 'informed revocation'. Based on this model, a Hoare-style logic is developed to capture the effects of expressing indi- viduals' consent and revocation preferences. The logic is designed to support certain desirable properties, defined as healthiness conditions. Proofs that these conditions hold are provided with the use of Maude software. This mathematical logic is then verified in three real-world case study applications with different consent and revocation requirements for the management of employee data in a business envi- ronment, medical data in a biobank and identity assurance in government services. The results confirm the richness and the expressiveness of the logic. In addition, a novel testing strategy underpinned by this logic is presented. This strategy is able to generate testing suites for systems offering consent and revocation controls, such as the EnCoRe system, where testing was carried out successfully and resulted in identifying faults in the EnCoRe implementation

Interim research assessment 2003-2005 - Computer Science

This report primarily serves as a source of information for the 2007 Interim Research Assessment Committee for Computer Science at the three technical universities in the Netherlands. The report also provides information for others interested in our research activities