From cyber-security deception to manipulation and gratification through gamification

Over the last two decades the field of cyber-security has experienced numerous changes associated with the evolution of other fields, such as networking, mobile communications, and recently the Internet of Things (IoT) [3]. Changes in mindsets have also been witnessed, a couple of years ago the cyber-security industry only blamed users for their mistakes often depicted as the number one reason behind security breaches. Nowadays, companies are empowering users, modifying their perception of being the weak link, into being the center-piece of the network design [4]. Users are by definition "in control" and therefore a cyber-security asset. Researchers have focused on the gamification of cyber- security elements, helping users to learn and understand the concepts of attacks and threats, allowing them to become the first line of defense to report anoma- lies [5]. However, over the past years numerous infrastructures have suffered from malicious intent, data breaches, and crypto-ransomeware, clearly showing the technical "know-how" of hackers and their ability to bypass any security in place, demonstrating that no infrastructure, software or device can be consid- ered secure. Researchers concentrated on the gamification, learning and teaching theory of cyber-security to end-users in numerous fields through various techniques and scenarios to raise cyber-situational awareness [2][1]. However, they overlooked the users’ ability to gather information on these attacks. In this paper, we argue that there is an endemic issue in the the understanding of hacking practices leading to vulnerable devices, software and architectures. We therefore propose a transparent gamification platform for hackers. The platform is designed with hacker user-interaction and deception in mind enabling researchers to gather data on the techniques and practices of hackers. To this end, we developed a fully extendable gamification architecture allowing researchers to deploy virtualised hosts on the internet. Each virtualised hosts contains a specific vulnerability (i.e. web application, software, etc). Each vulnerability is connected to a game engine, an interaction engine and a scoring engine

Scaled Momentum Spectra in Deep Inelastic Scattering at HERA

Charged particle production has been studied in neutral current deep inelastic ep scattering with the ZEUS detector at HERA using an integrated luminosity of 0.44 fb?1. Distributions of scaled momenta in the Breit frame are presented for particles in the current fragmentation region. The evolution of these spectra with the photon virtuality, Q2, is described in the kinematic region 10 \u3c Q2\u3c 41000Ge V2. Next-to-leading-order and modified leading-log-approximation QCD calculations as well as predictions from Monte Carlo models are compared to the data. The results are also compared to e+e? annihilation data. The dependences of the pseudorapidity distribution of the particles on Q2 and on the energy in the p system, W, are presented and interpreted in the context of the hypothesis of limiting fragmentation

Inclusive Dijet Cross Sections in Neutral Current Deep Inelastic Scattering at HERA

Single- and double-differential inclusive dijet cross sections in neutral current deep inelastic ep scattering have been measured with the ZEUS detector using an integrated luminosity of 374 pb-1. The measurement was performed at large values of the photon virtuality, Q2, between 125 and 20 000 GeV2. The jets were reconstructed with the kT cluster algorithm in the Breit reference frame and selected by requiring their transverse energies in the Breit frame, ET,Bjet, to be larger than 8 GeV. In addition, the invariant mass of the dijet system, Mjj, was required to be greater than 20 GeV. The cross sections are described by the predictions of next-to-leading-order QCD. © 2010 The Author(s)

Measurement of High-Q\u3csup\u3e2\u3c/sup\u3e Charged Current Deep Inelastic Scattering Cross Sections with a Longitudinally Polarised Positron Beam at HERA

Measurements of the cross sections for charged current deep inelastic scattering in e+p collisions with a longitudinally polarised positron beam are presented. The measurements are based on a data sample with an integrated luminosity of 132 pb-1 collected with the ZEUS detector at HERA at a centre-of-mass energy of 318 GeV. The total cross section is presented at positive and negative values of the longitudinal polarisation of the positron beams. The single-differential cross-sections dσ/dQ2, dσ/dx and dσ/dy are presented for Q2\u3e200 GeV2. The reduced cross-section σ̃ is presented in the kinematic range 20

High-E_T dijet photoproduction at HERA

The cross section for high-E_T dijet production in photoproduction has been measured with the ZEUS detector at HERA using an integrated luminosity of 81.8 pb-1. The events were required to have a virtuality of the incoming photon, Q^2, of less than 1 GeV^2 and a photon-proton centre-of-mass energy in the range 142 < W < 293 GeV. Events were selected if at least two jets satisfied the transverse-energy requirements of E_T(jet1) > 20 GeV and E_T(jet2) > 15 GeV and pseudorapidity requirements of -1 < eta(jet1,2) < 3, with at least one of the jets satisfying -1 < eta(jet) < 2.5. The measurements show sensitivity to the parton distributions in the photon and proton and effects beyond next-to-leading order in QCD. Hence these data can be used to constrain further the parton densities in the proton and photon.Comment: 36 pages, 13 figures, 20 tables, including minor revisions from referees. Accepted by Phys. Rev.

Measurement of D\u3csup\u3e+\u3c/sup\u3e and Λ\u3csub\u3ec\u3c/sub\u3e\u3csup\u3e+\u3c/sup\u3e Production in Deep Inelastic Scattering at HERA

Charm production in deep inelastic scattering has been measured with the ZEUS detector at HERA using an integrated luminosity of 120 pb-1. The hadronic decay channels D+ → KS0π+, Λc+ → pKS0 and Λc+ → Λπ+, and their charge conjugates, were reconstructed. The presence of a neutral strange hadron in the final state reduces the combinatorial background and extends the measured sensitivity into the low transverse momentum region. The kinematic range is 0 \u3c pT (D+,Λc+ ) \u3c 10GeV, |η(D+,Λc+ )| \u3c 1.6, 1.5 \u3c Q2 \u3c 1000GeV2 and 0.02 \u3c y \u3c 0.7. Inclusive and differential cross sections for the production of D+ mesons are compared to next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. The fraction of c quarks hadronising into Λc+ baryons is extracted

Measurement of Beauty Production in DIS and F\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3e\u3csup\u3eBb̄\u3c/sup\u3e Extraction at ZEUS: The ZEUS Collaboration

Beauty production in deep inelastic scattering with events in which a muon and a jet are observed in the final state has been measured with the ZEUS detector at HERA using an integrated luminosity of 114 pb-1. The fraction of events with beauty quarks in the data was determined using the distribution of the transverse momentum of the muon relative to the jet. The cross section for beauty production was measured in the kinematic range of photon virtuality, Q2\u3e2 GeV2, and inelasticity, 0.0

Inclusive-jet Photoproduction at HERA and Determination of α \u3csub\u3es\u3c/sub\u3e

Inclusive-jet cross sections have been measured in the reaction ep→e+jet+X for photon virtuality Q 2γp centre-of-mass energies in the region 142γp-1. Jets were identified using the k T, anti-k T or SIScone jet algorithms in the laboratory frame. Single-differential cross sections are presented as functions of the jet transverse energy, ETjet, and pseudorapidity, jet, for jets with ETjet\u3e17 GeV and -1\u3c je

Measurement of (anti)deuteron and (anti)proton production in DIS at HERA

The first observation of (anti)deuterons in deep inelastic scattering at HERA has been made with the ZEUS detector at a centre-of-mass energy of 300--318 GeV using an integrated luminosity of 120 pb-1. The measurement was performed in the central rapidity region for transverse momentum per unit of mass in the range 0.3<p_T/M<0.7. The particle rates have been extracted and interpreted in terms of the coalescence model. The (anti)deuteron production yield is smaller than the (anti)proton yield by approximately three orders of magnitude, consistent with the world measurements.Comment: 26 pages, 9 figures, 5 tables, submitted to Nucl. Phys.