ZETA - Zero-Trust Authentication: Relying on Innate Human Ability, not Technology

Reliable authentication requires the devices and channels involved in the process to be trustworthy; otherwise authentication secrets can easily be compromised. Given the unceasing efforts of attackers worldwide such trustworthiness is increasingly not a given. A variety of technical solutions, such as utilising multiple devices/channels and verification protocols, has the potential to mitigate the threat of untrusted communications to a certain extent. Yet such technical solutions make two assumptions: (1) users have access to multiple devices and (2) attackers will not resort to hacking the human, using social engineering techniques. In this paper, we propose and explore the potential of using human-based computation instead of solely technical solutions to mitigate the threat of untrusted devices and channels. ZeTA (Zero Trust Authentication on untrusted channels) has the potential to allow people to authenticate despite compromised channels or communications and easily observed usage. Our contributions are threefold: (1) We propose the ZeTA protocol with a formal definition and security analysis that utilises semantics and human-based computation to ameliorate the problem of untrusted devices and channels. (2) We outline a security analysis to assess the envisaged performance of the proposed authentication protocol. (3) We report on a usability study that explores the viability of relying on human computation in this context

Big Data in Critical Infrastructures Security Monitoring: Challenges and Opportunities

Critical Infrastructures (CIs), such as smart power grids, transport systems, and financial infrastructures, are more and more vulnerable to cyber threats, due to the adoption of commodity computing facilities. Despite the use of several monitoring tools, recent attacks have proven that current defensive mechanisms for CIs are not effective enough against most advanced threats. In this paper we explore the idea of a framework leveraging multiple data sources to improve protection capabilities of CIs. Challenges and opportunities are discussed along three main research directions: i) use of distinct and heterogeneous data sources, ii) monitoring with adaptive granularity, and iii) attack modeling and runtime combination of multiple data analysis techniques.Comment: EDCC-2014, BIG4CIP-201

Territorial-Administrative Decentralisation and Ethnocultural Diversity in Ukraine: Addressing Hungarian Autonomy Claims in Zakarpattya

The paper argues firstly that, since there is no obvious separatist movement within Zakarpattya, the Ukrainian state should seek as far as possible to accommodate Hungarian identity claims within the region (and those of other smaller minority communities living within the state) as part of a normative and instrumental strategy of promoting ‘unity in diversity’. Secondly, it argues that Ukraine’s current concept of decentralization offers space to realise the non-territorial vision of cultural autonomy, provided that sufficient attention is also given to maintaining pre-existing territorially-based provisions with regard to minority language use and political representation for Hungarians at both regional and national level

Fuzzy TOPSIS-based Secure Neighbor Discovery Mechanism for Improving Reliable Data Dissemination in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) being an indispensable entity of the Internet of Things (IoT) are found to be more and more widely utilized for the rapid advent of IoT environment. The reliability of data dissemination in the IoT environment completely depends on the secure neighbor discovery mechanism that are utilized for effective and efficient communication among the sensor nodes. Secure neighbor discovery mechanisms that significantly determine trustworthy sensor nodes are essential for maintaining potential connectivity and sustaining reliable data delivery in the energy-constrained self organizing WSN. In this paper, Fuzzy Technique of Order Preference Similarity to the Ideal Solution (TOPSIS)-based Secure Neighbor Discovery Mechanism (FTOPSIS-SNDM) is proposed for estimating the trust of each sensor node in the established routing path for the objective of enhancing reliable data delivery in WSNs. This proposed FTOPSIS-SNDM is proposed as an attempt to integrate the merits of Fuzzy Set Theory (FST) and TOPSIS-based Multi-criteria Decision Making (MCDM) approach, since the discovery of secure neighbors involves the exchange of imprecise data and uncertain behavior of sensor nodes. This secure neighbor is also influenced by the factors of packet forwarding potential, delay, distance from the Base Station (BS) and residual energy, which in turn depends on multiple constraints that could be possibly included into the process of secure neighbor discovery. The simulation investigations of the proposed FTOPSIS-SNDM confirmed its predominance over the benchmarked approaches in terms of throughput, energy consumption, network latency, communication overhead for varying number of genuine and malicious neighboring sensor nodes in network

The Impact of Language on Educational Access in South Africa

The role of Medium of Instruction (MoI) or Language of Learning and Teaching (LoL&T) has not received sufficient attention as a factor denying meaningful access to education in South Africa. Yet the majority of under-performing learners are also children who learn in a language that is not their mother-tongue. This research aims to assess how recent language policies have changed the linguistic practices of schools and how this impacts on 'meaningful' access (understood as learners' access to the curriculum and therefore broad content knowledge). Interviews and open discussions were conducted with principals, teachers and parents from various township schools located in Mlazi (KwaZulu Natal) and in Soweto and Attridgeville (Gauteng) to illustrate the problems. The paper unpicks the different solutions - taken and proposed – to the disjuncture between MoI and meaningful access, whilst taking into account the legacy of past policies. Several proposals have been made to improve educational outcomes within the existing policy regarding medium of instruction (MoI) and language in general. Other proposals, in order to give transformation in education more immediate and concrete content, seek to exploit to its limit, or even alter, the official framework. They claim that such a move is a condition to reverse the overall poor outcome among learners from disadvantaged backgrounds. The MoI issue has sometimes been invoked in the debate on the relevance in societies of the periphery of what some see as essentially a Western educational model, a debate that the African renaissance ideology has helped rekindle in South Africa