Exploratory study to explore the role of ICT in the process of knowledge management in an Indian business environment

In the 21st century and the emergence of a digital economy, knowledge and the knowledge base economy are rapidly growing. To effectively be able to understand the processes involved in the creating, managing and sharing of knowledge management in the business environment is critical to the success of an organization. This study builds on the previous research of the authors on the enablers of knowledge management by identifying the relationship between the enablers of knowledge management and the role played by information communication technologies (ICT) and ICT infrastructure in a business setting. This paper provides the findings of a survey collected from the four major Indian cities (Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai and Villupuram) regarding their views and opinions about the enablers of knowledge management in business setting. A total of 80 organizations participated in the study with 100 participants in each city. The results show that ICT and ICT infrastructure can play a critical role in the creating, managing and sharing of knowledge in an Indian business environment

Two-Party Threshold Key Agreement Protocol for MANETs using Pairings

In MANET environment, the nodes are mobile i.e., nodes move in and out dynamically. This causes difficulty in maintaining a central trusted authority say Certification Authority CA or Key Generation Centre KCG. In addition most of cryptographic techniques need a key to be shared between the two communicating entities. So to introduce security in MANET environment, there is a basic need of sharing a key between the two communicating entities without the use of central trusted authority. So we present a decentralized two-party key agreement protocol using pairings and threshold cryptography ideas. Our model is based on Joux2019;s three-party key agreement protocol which does not authenticate the users and hence is vulnerable to man-in-the-middle attack. This model protects from man-in-the-middle attack using threshold cryptography

A Survey on Wireless Sensor Network Security

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have recently attracted a lot of interest in the research community due their wide range of applications. Due to distributed nature of these networks and their deployment in remote areas, these networks are vulnerable to numerous security threats that can adversely affect their proper functioning. This problem is more critical if the network is deployed for some mission-critical applications such as in a tactical battlefield. Random failure of nodes is also very likely in real-life deployment scenarios. Due to resource constraints in the sensor nodes, traditional security mechanisms with large overhead of computation and communication are infeasible in WSNs. Security in sensor networks is, therefore, a particularly challenging task. This paper discusses the current state of the art in security mechanisms for WSNs. Various types of attacks are discussed and their countermeasures presented. A brief discussion on the future direction of research in WSN security is also included.Comment: 24 pages, 4 figures, 2 table

Key Management in Wireless Sensor Networks, IP-Based Sensor Networks, Content Centric Networks

Cryptographic keys and their management in network communication is considered the main building block of security over which other security primitives are based. These cryptographic keys ensure the privacy, authentication, integrity and non-repudiation of messages. However, the use of these cryptographic keys and their management in dealing with the resource constrained devices (i.e. Sensor nodes) is a challenging task. A number of key management schemes have been introduced by researchers all over the world for such resource constrained networks. For example, light weight PKI and elliptic curve cryptography schemes are computationally expensive for these resource constrained devices. So far the symmetric key approach is considered best for these constrained networks and different variants of it been developed for these networks (i.e. probabilistic key distribution approach). The probabilistic key distribution approach consumes less memory than the standard symmetric key approach but it suffers from the connectivity issues (i.e. the connectivity depends on the common shared keys between the nodes). Most of those schemes were proposed by considering static sensor networks (e.g. Industrial process monitoring, Environmental monitoring, movement detection in military applications, forests etc.). However, the use of these existing key management schemes for mobile wireless sensor networks applications introduces more challenges in terms of network connectivity, energy consumption, memory cost, communication overhead and protection of key materials against some well known attacks. Keeping these challenges in mind, previous research has proposed some key management schemes considering the mobility scenarios in ad hoc networks and wireless sensor networks (e.g. vehicular networks, health monitoring systems).However these schemes consume more resource because of a much higher communication packet exchange during the handover phase for the authentication of joining and leaving nodes than the static networks where there is no extra communication for the handover and authentication. The motivation of this research work is to investigate and propose new algorithms not only to improve the efficiency of these existing authentication and key management schemes in terms of connectivity, memory and security by considering the mobility scenario in wireless sensor networks, but also to develop new algorithms that suit these constrained networks than the existing schemes. First, we choose the existing key pool approach for authentication and key management and improve its network connectivity and resilience against some well known attacks (e.g. node capturing attacks) while reduce the memory cost by storing those key pools in each sensor node. In the proposed solution, we have divided the main key pool into two virtual mutually exclusive key pools. This division and constructing a key from two chosen keys, one from each key pool, helps to reduce the memory cost of each node by assigning fewer keys for the same level of network connectivity as the existing key pool frameworks. Although, the proposed key pool approach increases the network resilience against node compromission attacks because of the smaller number of keys assigned to each node, however it does not completely nullify the effect of the attacks. Hence we proposed an online mutual authentication and key establishment and management scheme for sensor networks that provides almost 100\% network connectivity and also nullifies the effect of node compromission attacks. In the proposed online key generation approach, the secret key is dependent on both communicating parties. Once the two communicating parties authenticate each other, they would successfully establish a secret communication key, otherwise they stop communication and inform the network manager about the intruder detection and activity. The last part of the thesis considers the integration of two different technologies (i.e. wireless sensor networks and IP networks). This is a very interesting and demanding research area because of its numerous applications, such as smart energy, smart city etc.. However the security requirements of these two kind of networks (resource constrained and resourceful) make key management a challenging task. Hence we use an online key generation approach using elliptic curve cryptography which gives the same security level as the standard PKI approach used in IP networks with smaller key length and is suited for the sensor network packet size limitations. It also uses a less computationally expensive approach than PKI and hence makes ECC suitable to be adopted in wireless sensor networks. In the key management scheme for IP based sensor networks, we generate the public private key pair based on ECC for each individual sensor node. However the public key is not only dependent on the node's parameter but also the parameters of the network to which it belongs. This increases the security of the proposed solution and avoids intruders pretending to be authentic members of the network(s) by spreading their own public keys. In the last part of the thesis we consider Content Centric Networking (CCN) which is a new routing architecture for the internet of the future. Building on the observation that today's communications are more oriented towards content retrieval (web, P2P, etc.) than point-to-point communications (VoIP, IM, etc.), CCN proposes a radical revision of the Internet architecture switching from named hosts (TCP/IP protocols) to named data to best match its current usage. In a nutshell, content is addressable, routable, self-sufficient and authenticated, while locations no longer matter. Data is seen and identified directly by a routable name instead of a location (the address of the server). Consequently, data is directly requested at the network level not from its holder, hence there is no need for the DNS). To improve content diffusion, CCN relies on data distribution and duplication, because storage is cheaper than bandwidth: every content - particularly popular one - can be replicated and stored on any CCN node, even untrustworthy. People looking for particular content can securely retrieve it in a P2P-way from the best locations available. So far, there has been little investigation of the security of CCNs and there is no specific key management scheme for that. We propose an authentication and key establishment scheme for CCNs in which the contents are authenticated by the content generating node, using pre-distributed shares of encryption keys. The content requesting node can get those shares from any node in the network, even from malicious and intruder ones, in accordance with a key concept of CCNs. In our work we also provide means to protect the distributed shares from modification by these malicious/intruder nodes. The proposed scheme is again an online key generation approach but including a relation between the content and its encryption key. This dependency prevents the attackers from modifying the packet or the key share

The enablers and implementation model for mobile KMS in Australian healthcare

In this research project, the enablers in implementing mobile KMS in Australian regional healthcare will be investigated, and a validated framework and guidelines to assist healthcare in implementing mobile KMS will also be proposed with both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The outcomes for this study are expected to improve the understanding the enabling factors in implementing mobile KMS in Australian healthcare, as well as provide better guidelines for this process

A Holistic Analysis of Internet of Things (IoT) Security : Principles, Practices, and New Perspectives

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Key Management in Wireless Sensor Networks, IP-Based Sensor Networks, Content Centric Networks

Cryptographic keys and their management in network communication is considered the main building block of security over which other security primitives are based. These cryptographic keys ensure the privacy, authentication, integrity and non-repudiation of messages. However, the use of these cryptographic keys and their management in dealing with the resource constrained devices (i.e. Sensor nodes) is a challenging task. A number of key management schemes have been introduced by researchers all over the world for such resource constrained networks. For example, light weight PKI and elliptic curve cryptography schemes are computationally expensive for these resource constrained devices. So far the symmetric key approach is considered best for these constrained networks and different variants of it been developed for these networks (i.e. probabilistic key distribution approach). The probabilistic key distribution approach consumes less memory than the standard symmetric key approach but it suffers from the connectivity issues (i.e. the connectivity depends on the common shared keys between the nodes). Most of those schemes were proposed by considering static sensor networks (e.g. Industrial process monitoring, Environmental monitoring, movement detection in military applications, forests etc.). However, the use of these existing key management schemes for mobile wireless sensor networks applications introduces more challenges in terms of network connectivity, energy consumption, memory cost, communication overhead and protection of key materials against some well known attacks. Keeping these challenges in mind, previous research has proposed some key management schemes considering the mobility scenarios in ad hoc networks and wireless sensor networks (e.g. vehicular networks, health monitoring systems).However these schemes consume more resource because of a much higher communication packet exchange during the handover phase for the authentication of joining and leaving nodes than the static networks where there is no extra communication for the handover and authentication. The motivation of this research work is to investigate and propose new algorithms not only to improve the efficiency of these existing authentication and key management schemes in terms of connectivity, memory and security by considering the mobility scenario in wireless sensor networks, but also to develop new algorithms that suit these constrained networks than the existing schemes. First, we choose the existing key pool approach for authentication and key management and improve its network connectivity and resilience against some well known attacks (e.g. node capturing attacks) while reduce the memory cost by storing those key pools in each sensor node. In the proposed solution, we have divided the main key pool into two virtual mutually exclusive key pools. This division and constructing a key from two chosen keys, one from each key pool, helps to reduce the memory cost of each node by assigning fewer keys for the same level of network connectivity as the existing key pool frameworks. Although, the proposed key pool approach increases the network resilience against node compromission attacks because of the smaller number of keys assigned to each node, however it does not completely nullify the effect of the attacks. Hence we proposed an online mutual authentication and key establishment and management scheme for sensor networks that provides almost 100\% network connectivity and also nullifies the effect of node compromission attacks. In the proposed online key generation approach, the secret key is dependent on both communicating parties. Once the two communicating parties authenticate each other, they would successfully establish a secret communication key, otherwise they stop communication and inform the network manager about the intruder detection and activity. The last part of the thesis considers the integration of two different technologies (i.e. wireless sensor networks and IP networks). This is a very interesting and demanding research area because of its numerous applications, such as smart energy, smart city etc.. However the security requirements of these two kind of networks (resource constrained and resourceful) make key management a challenging task. Hence we use an online key generation approach using elliptic curve cryptography which gives the same security level as the standard PKI approach used in IP networks with smaller key length and is suited for the sensor network packet size limitations. It also uses a less computationally expensive approach than PKI and hence makes ECC suitable to be adopted in wireless sensor networks. In the key management scheme for IP based sensor networks, we generate the public private key pair based on ECC for each individual sensor node. However the public key is not only dependent on the node's parameter but also the parameters of the network to which it belongs. This increases the security of the proposed solution and avoids intruders pretending to be authentic members of the network(s) by spreading their own public keys. In the last part of the thesis we consider Content Centric Networking (CCN) which is a new routing architecture for the internet of the future. Building on the observation that today's communications are more oriented towards content retrieval (web, P2P, etc.) than point-to-point communications (VoIP, IM, etc.), CCN proposes a radical revision of the Internet architecture switching from named hosts (TCP/IP protocols) to named data to best match its current usage. In a nutshell, content is addressable, routable, self-sufficient and authenticated, while locations no longer matter. Data is seen and identified directly by a routable name instead of a location (the address of the server). Consequently, data is directly requested at the network level not from its holder, hence there is no need for the DNS). To improve content diffusion, CCN relies on data distribution and duplication, because storage is cheaper than bandwidth: every content - particularly popular one - can be replicated and stored on any CCN node, even untrustworthy. People looking for particular content can securely retrieve it in a P2P-way from the best locations available. So far, there has been little investigation of the security of CCNs and there is no specific key management scheme for that. We propose an authentication and key establishment scheme for CCNs in which the contents are authenticated by the content generating node, using pre-distributed shares of encryption keys. The content requesting node can get those shares from any node in the network, even from malicious and intruder ones, in accordance with a key concept of CCNs. In our work we also provide means to protect the distributed shares from modification by these malicious/intruder nodes. The proposed scheme is again an online key generation approach but including a relation between the content and its encryption key. This dependency prevents the attackers from modifying the packet or the key shares

A Novel Secure Patient Data Transmission through Wireless Body Area Network: Health Tele-Monitoring

The security of sensitive data obtained from a patient has not been implemented properly because of energy issues of sensor nodes in Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN) and constrained resources such as computational power and low battery life. The main of this paper is to enhance the security level of data transmission between patient and health service provider by considering the availability of energy at sensor nodes. The proposed system consists of a hybrid Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) and Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC), which provides simple, fast and high cryptographic strength of data security. ECC is used for securing AES encryption keys, and AES algorithm is used for encrypting/decrypting text. A scenario where sensor nodes are continuously supplied energy from solar power is considered and based upon the energy availability; respective encryption technique is implemented. The result shows that the proposed EEHEE algorithm increases the encryption of the data file by more than 19% compared to the State of Art's solution. The proposed EEHEE system is 11% faster in encrypting data file and reduces the energy consumption by 34 % compared to the current best solution.  The proposed system concentrates on reducing the energy consumption in WBAN and increasing cryptographic strength to the system by using the hybrid symmetric and asymmetric algorithm. Thus, this study provides an efficient scheme to enhance security for real-time data transmission in telemedicine