La biométrie, sa fiabilité et ses impacts sur la pratique de la démocratie libérale

La biométrie, c'est-à-dire la technologie qui mesure les caractéristiques du vivant, est de plus en plus utilisée depuis une dizaine d'années, surtout dans le domaine de la sécurité. Celle-ci connaît une croissance exponentielle depuis les attentats du 11 septembre 2001, surtout que cet acte terroriste a été suivi par ceux de Madrid en 2004 et de Londres en 2005. Le terrorisme a par conséquent imposé le thème de la sécurité à tous les acteurs de la société, tant les décideurs que les simples citoyens. La biométrie s'impose donc de plus en plus aux yeux des États comme solution sécuritaire par excellence ce qui n'est pas sans inquiéter les organisations de défense des droits de l'Homme. Ce mémoire aborde deux questions centrales: est-ce que l'application généralisée de technologies biométriques peut être garante de l'atteinte d'un niveau idéal de sécurité personnelle et collective d'une part et est-ce que, d'autre part, l'utilisation de ces technologies menace le droit à la vie privée. La démocratie libérale, un concept clé dans ce travail, est fondée sur le concept du privé: le citoyen privé qui est protégé du gouvernement avec des droits inaliénables dont celui, dans la plus pure tradition de John Locke, de la propriété privée et qui a donné vie au concept de la sphère privée vue comme un sanctuaire sur lequel même les plus puissants, en particulier le gouvernement, ne pourraient empiéter. C'est pourquoi l'idée de vie privée est le concept central de ce travail et le sous-tendra tout au long de celui-ci. Ainsi seront définis et explicités les concepts de sphère privée et de sphère publique qui seront aussi complétés avec les différents degrés de vie privée. Le cadre analytique de ce mémoire abordera cette question en utilisant le concept du contrôle informationnel (c'est-à-dire le contrôle qu'un individu peut ou non exercer sur l'information que des organisations possèdent sur lui) et celui du contrôle sensoriel (l'accès et le non-accès physiques et mentaux aux organes sensoriels des autres ou des institutions).\ud Ce mémoire est divisé en trois chapitres. Les deux premiers sont essentiellement factuels et empiriques: le premier aborde l'histoire de la biométrie tandis que le deuxième présente son aspect technologique et sa fiabilité. Le troisième chapitre, normatif, est le coeur du mémoire, et analyse les conséquences de la biométrie sur la vie privée et par conséquent sur la pratique de la démocratie libérale. C'est dans ce chapitre que les deux fonctions explicitées dans le cadre analytique seront utilisées. D'abord, le contrôle informationnel sera surtout utilisé pour la première section sur les banques de données de plus en plus omniprésentes ainsi que pour la quatrième et dernière section portant sur le risque de glissement vers une situation non initialement prévue (de l'anglais creep function) du fait de la perte sournoise de contrôle des informations que les institutions et les organisations détiennent sur les gens avec en exemple une étude de cas sur le numéro d'assurance sociale aux États-Unis. La troisième partie portant sur le terrorisme sera aussi abordée en partie sous cet angle. La deuxième fonction, le contrôle de l'accès sensoriel, est celle qui permet ou non d'avoir une sphère privée avec tout ce que cela implique et permet d'analyser les 2e et 3e parties de ce chapitre, c'est-à-dire le Panopticon et son risque de normalisation des comportements et de la société en général et puis la lutte contre la criminalité et le terrorisme qui tend à justifier fallacieusement un peu tout et n'importe quoi dans le domaine biométrique. C'est un travail essentiellement normatif, autour d'une thématique qui oriente la réflexion sur le sujet de la vie privée, la sécurité et de la démocratie. C'est donc la question du droit à la vie privée qui sous-tend ce travail. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Biométrie, Démocratie libérale, Sphère privée, Vie privée, Sécurité, Technologies de sécurité

Abnormal insulin-like growth factor 1 signaling in human osteoarthritic subchondral bone osteoblasts

Insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-1 is a key factor in bone homeostasis and could be involved in bone tissue sclerosis as observed in osteoarthritis (OA). Here, we compare the key signaling pathways triggered in response to IGF-1 stimulation between normal and OA osteoblasts (Obs). Primary Obs were prepared from the subchondral bone of tibial plateaus of OA patients undergoing knee replacement or from normal individuals at autopsy. Phenotypic characterization of Obs was evaluated with alkaline phosphatase and osteocalcin release. The effect of IGF-1 on cell proliferation, alkaline phosphatase and collagen synthesis was evaluated in the presence or not of 50 ng/ml IGF-1, whereas signaling was studied with proteins separated by SDS-PAGE before western blot analysis. We also used immunoprecipitation followed by western blot analysis to detect interactions between key IGF-1 signaling elements. IGF-1 receptor (IGF-1R), Shc, Grb2, insulin receptor substrate (IRS)-1, and p42/44 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) levels were similar in normal and OA Obs in the presence or absence of IGF-1. After IGF-1 stimulation, the phosphorylation of IGF-1R in normal and OA Obs was similar; however, the phosphorylation of IRS-1 was reduced in OA Ob. In addition, the PI3K pathway was activated similarly in normal and OA Obs while that for p42/44 MAPK was higher in OA Obs compared to normal. p42/44 MAPK can be triggered via an IRS-1/Syp or Grb2/Shc interaction. Interestingly, Syp was poorly phosphorylated under basal conditions in normal Obs and was rapidly phosphorylated upon IGF-1 stimulation, yet Syp showed a poor interaction with IRS-1. In contrast, Syp was highly phosphorylated in OA Obs and its interaction with IRS-1 was very strong initially, yet rapidly dropped with IGF-1 treatments. The interaction of Grb2 with IRS-1 progressively increased in response to IGF-1 in OA Obs whereas this was absent in normal Ob. IGF-1 stimulation altered alkaline phosphatase in Ob, an effect reduced in the presence of PD98059, an inhibitor of p42/44 MAPK signaling, whereas neither IGF-1 nor PD98059 had any significant effect on collagen synthesis. In contrast, cell proliferation was higher in OA Obs compared to normal under basal conditions, and IGF-1 stimulated more cell proliferation in OA Obs than in normal Ob, an effect totally dependent on p42/44 MAPK activiy. The altered response of OA Obs to IGF-1 may be due to abnormal IGF-1 signaling in these cells. This is mostly linked with abnormal IRS-1/Syp and IRS-1/Grb2 interaction in these cells

Bacillus subtilis Early Colonization of Arabidopsis thaliana Roots Involves Multiple Chemotaxis Receptors

ABSTRACT Colonization of plant roots by Bacillus subtilis is mutually beneficial to plants and bacteria. Plants can secrete up to 30% of their fixed carbon via root exudates, thereby feeding the bacteria, and in return the associated B. subtilis bacteria provide the plant with many growth-promoting traits. Formation of a biofilm on the root by matrix-producing B. subtilis is a well-established requirement for long-term colonization. However, we observed that cells start forming a biofilm only several hours after motile cells first settle on the plant. We also found that intact chemotaxis machinery is required for early root colonization by B. subtilis and for plant protection. Arabidopsis thaliana root exudates attract B. subtilis in vitro, an activity mediated by the two characterized chemoreceptors, McpB and McpC, as well as by the orphan receptor TlpC. Nonetheless, bacteria lacking these chemoreceptors are still able to colonize the root, suggesting that other chemoreceptors might also play a role in this process. These observations suggest that A. thaliana actively recruits B. subtilis through root-secreted molecules, and our results stress the important roles of B. subtilis chemoreceptors for efficient colonization of plants in natural environments. These results demonstrate a remarkable strategy adapted by beneficial rhizobacteria to utilize carbon-rich root exudates, which may facilitate rhizobacterial colonization and a mutualistic association with the host

Since the DARPA Intrusion Detection Evaluation Data

An Intrusion Detection System (IDS) is a crucial element of a network security posture. Although there are many IDS products available, it is rather difficult to find information about their accuracy. Only a few organizations evaluate these products. Furthermore, the data used to test and evaluate these IDS is usually proprietary. Thus, the research community cannot easily evaluate the next generation of IDS. Toward this end

Passive network discovery for real time situation awareness

Network security analysts are confronted with numerous ambiguities when interpreting alerts produced by security devices. Even with the increased accuracy of these tools, analysts still have to sort through a tremendous number of potential security events in order to maintain the desired level of assurance. This paper describes how passive network discovery and persistent monitoring can provide significant contextual information valuable to network security professionals responsible for protecting the network. Techniques discussed include the capability to discover active nodes, their operating systems, the role they carry out, their system uptime, the services they offer, the protocols they support, and their IP network configuration. An attractive feature of this approach is that it focuses on mechanisms that do not rely on access to user data. While this is rarely a concern for the intruder, it can be of the utmost importance to the security analyst. One of the main interests in using a passive approach is that the information gathering process has no impact on the bandwidth or on the monitored assets. This is in contrast with active scanning techniques that are often noisy and intrusive. Passive techniques can be used at all times, allowing near real-time awareness of the security posture of ever-changing networks, and thus helping network administrators remain in control and anticipate upcoming security problems. A network monitoring prototype has been developed to test the techniques described in this paper. 1

On the verification and validation of signature-based, network intrusion detection systems

An Intrusion Detection System (IDS) protects computer networks against attacks and intrusions in combination with firewalls and anti-virus systems. One class of IDS is called signature-based network IDSs as they monitor network traffic, looking for evidence of malicious behaviour as specified in attack descriptions (referred to as signatures). It is common knowledge in the research community that IDSs have problems accurately identifying attacks. In this paper we discuss this accuracy problem and decompose it into a detection problem and a confirmation problem. We then map the evaluation of this accuracy problem to the traditional software verification and validation problem, which allows us to analyze the techniques academics have been using to evaluate their IDS technologies. As a result, we are able to identify areas where research is needed to improve the assessment of the IDS accuracy problem through verification and validation techniques

An analysis of signature overlaps in Intrusion Detection Systems

An Intrusion Detection System (IDS) protects computer networks against attacks and intrusions, in combination with firewalls and anti-virus systems. One class of IDS is called signature-based network IDSs, as they monitor network traffic, looking for evidence of malicious behaviour as specified in attack descriptions (referred to as signatures). Many studies report that IDSs, including signature-based network IDSs, have problems to accurately identify attacks. One possible reason that we observed in our past work, and that is worth investigating further, is that several signatures (i.e., several alarms) can be triggered on the same group of packets, a situation we coined overlapping signatures. This paper presents a technique to precisely and systematically quantify the signature overlapping problem of an IDS signature database. The solution we describe is based on set theory and finite state automaton theory, and we experiment with our technique on one widely-used and maintained IDS. Results show that our approach is effective at systematically quantifying the overlap problem in one IDS signature database, and can be potentially used on other IDSs

Specification-based testing of intrusion detection engines using logical expression testing criteria

An Intrusion Detection System (IDS) protects computer networks against attacks and intrusions. One class of IDS is called signature-based network IDSs as they monitor network traffic, looking for evidence of malicious behaviour as specified in attack descriptions (referred to as signatures). Many studies report that IDSs have problems accurately identifying attacks. Therefore, it is important to precisely understand under which conditions IDSs accurately identify attacks or fail to do so. However, no systematic approach has so far been defined and used to study this problem. Recognizing that signatures in essence provide the specification of an IDS engine, studying the accuracy of an IDS engine becomes a black-box testing problem. We therefore precisely and systematically evaluate which mature testing techniques can be used (and adapted) to derive tests from IDS signatures. We experiment with those criteria on one widely used and maintained IDS and show that our approach is effective at systematically revealing problems in this IDS engine (e.g., problems that prevent the detection of attacks)