CRiBAC: Community-centric role interaction based access control model

As one of the most efficient solutions to complex and large-scale problems, multi-agent cooperation has been in the limelight for the past few decades. Recently, many research projects have focused on context-aware cooperation to dynamically provide complex services. As cooperation in the multi-agent systems (MASs) becomes more common, guaranteeing the security of such cooperation takes on even greater importance. However, existing security models do not reflect the agents' unique features, including cooperation and context-awareness. In this paper, we propose a Community-based Role interaction-based Access Control model (CRiBAC) to allow secure cooperation in MASs. To do this, we refine and extend our preliminary RiBAC model, which was proposed earlier to support secure interactions among agents, by introducing a new concept of interaction permission, and then extend it to CRiBAC to support community-based cooperation among agents. We analyze potential problems related to interaction permissions and propose two approaches to address them. We also propose an administration model to facilitate administration of CRiBAC policies. Finally, we present the implementation of a prototype system based on a sample scenario to assess the proposed work and show its feasibility. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

An Access Control Model to Facilitate Healthcare Information Access in Context of Team Collaboration

The delivery of healthcare relies on the sharing of patients information among a group of healthcare professionals (so-called multidisciplinary teams (MDTs)). At present, electronic health records (EHRs) are widely utilized system to create, manage and share patient healthcare information among MDTs. While it is necessary to provide healthcare professionals with privileges to access patient health information, providing too many privileges may backfire when healthcare professionals accidentally or intentionally abuse their privileges. Hence, finding a middle ground, where the necessary privileges are provided and malicious usage are avoided, is necessary. This thesis highlights the access control matters in collaborative healthcare domain. Focus is mainly on the collaborative activities that are best accomplished by organized MDTs within or among healthcare organizations with an objective of accomplishing a specific task (patient treatment). Initially, we investigate the importance and challenges of effective MDTs treatment, the sharing of patient healthcare records in healthcare delivery, patient data confidentiality and the need for flexible access of the MDTs corresponding to the requirements to fulfill their duties. Also, we discuss access control requirements in the collaborative environment with respect to EHRs and usage scenario of MDTs collaboration. Additionally, we provide summary of existing access control models along with their pros and cons pertaining to collaborative health systems. Second, we present a detailed description of the proposed access control model. In this model, the MDTs is classified based on Belbin’s team role theory to ensure that privileges are provided to the actual needs of healthcare professionals and to guarantee confidentiality as well as protect the privacy of sensitive patient information. Finally, evaluation indicates that our access control model has a number of advantages including flexibility in terms of permission management, since roles and team roles can be updated without updating privilege for every user. Moreover, the level of fine-grained control of access to patient EHRs that can be authorized to healthcare providers is managed and controlled based on the job required to meet the minimum necessary standard and need-to-know principle. Additionally, the model does not add significant administrative and performance overhead.publishedVersio

Reasoning on the usage control security policies over data artifact business process models

The inclusion of security aspects in organizations is a crucial aspect to ensure compliance with both internal and external regulations. Business process models are a well-known mechanism to describe and automate the activities of the organizations, which should include security policies to ensure the correct performance of the daily activities. Frequently, these security policies involve complex data which cannot be represented using the standard Business Process Model Notation (BPMN). In this paper, we propose the enrichment of the BPMN with a UML class diagram to describe the data model, that is also combined with security policies defined using the UCONABC framework annotated within the business process model. The integration of the business process model, the data model, and the security policies provides a context where more complex reasoning can be applied about the satisfiability of the security policies in accordance with the business process and data models. To do so, wetransform the original models, including security policies, into the BAUML framework (an artifact-centric approach to business process modelling). Once this is done, it is possible to ensure that there are no inherent errors in the model (verification) and that it fulfils the business requirements (validation), thus ensuring that the business process and the security policies are compatible and that they are aligned with the business security requirements.This work has been supported by Project PID2020-112540RB-C44 funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033, Project TIN2017-87610-R funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and FEDER “Una manera de hacer Europa”, Project 2017-SGR-1749 by the Generalitat de Catalunya, Projects COPERNICA (P20 01224) and METAMORFOSIS by the Junta de Andalucía.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

IaaS-cloud security enhancement: an intelligent attribute-based access control model and implementation

The cloud computing paradigm introduces an efficient utilisation of huge computing resources by multiple users with minimal expense and deployment effort compared to traditional computing facilities. Although cloud computing has incredible benefits, some governments and enterprises remain hesitant to transfer their computing technology to the cloud as a consequence of the associated security challenges. Security is, therefore, a significant factor in cloud computing adoption. Cloud services consist of three layers: Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). Cloud computing services are accessed through network connections and utilised by multi-users who can share the resources through virtualisation technology. Accordingly, an efficient access control system is crucial to prevent unauthorised access. This thesis mainly investigates the IaaS security enhancement from an access control point of view. [Continues.

Model-Based Analysis of Role-Based Access Control

Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) has been extensively studied. Many directions have been explored, sometimes with the dream of providing a fully integrated approach for designers, developers and other stakeholders to create, reason about and modify models representing software systems. Most, but not all, of the research in MDE has focused on general-purpose languages and models, such as Java and UML. Domain-specific and cross-cutting concerns, such as security, are increasingly essential parts of a software system, but are only treated as second-class citizens in the most popular modelling languages. Efforts have been made to give security, and in particular access control, a more prominent place in MDE, but most of these approaches require advanced knowledge in security, programming (often declarative), or both, making them difficult to use by less technically trained stakeholders. In this thesis, we propose an approach to modelling, analysing and automatically fixing role-based access control (RBAC) that does not require users to write code or queries themselves. To this end, we use two UML profiles and associated OCL constraints that provide the modelling and analysis features. We propose a taxonomy of OCL constraints and use it to define a partial order between categories of constraints, that we use to propose strategies to speed up the models’ evaluation time. Finally, by representing OCL constraints as constraints on a graph, we propose an automated approach for generating lists of model changes that can be applied to an incorrect model in order to fix it. All these features have been fully integrated into a UML modelling IDE, IBM Rational Software Architect

Model-Based Analysis of Role-Based Access Control

Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) has been extensively studied. Many directions have been explored, sometimes with the dream of providing a fully integrated approach for designers, developers and other stakeholders to create, reason about and modify models representing software systems. Most, but not all, of the research in MDE has focused on general-purpose languages and models, such as Java and UML. Domain-specific and cross-cutting concerns, such as security, are increasingly essential parts of a software system, but are only treated as second-class citizens in the most popular modelling languages. Efforts have been made to give security, and in particular access control, a more prominent place in MDE, but most of these approaches require advanced knowledge in security, programming (often declarative), or both, making them difficult to use by less technically trained stakeholders. In this thesis, we propose an approach to modelling, analysing and automatically fixing role-based access control (RBAC) that does not require users to write code or queries themselves. To this end, we use two UML profiles and associated OCL constraints that provide the modelling and analysis features. We propose a taxonomy of OCL constraints and use it to define a partial order between categories of constraints, that we use to propose strategies to speed up the models’ evaluation time. Finally, by representing OCL constraints as constraints on a graph, we propose an automated approach for generating lists of model changes that can be applied to an incorrect model in order to fix it. All these features have been fully integrated into a UML modelling IDE, IBM Rational Software Architect