Transparent password policies: A case study of investigating end-user situational awareness

Transparent password policies are utilized by organizations in an effort to ease the user from the burden of configuring authentication settings while maintaining a high level of security. However, authentication transparency can challenge security and usability and can impact the awareness of the end-users with regards to the protection level that is realistically achieved. For authentication transparency to be effective, the triptych security – usability – situational awareness should be considered when designing relevant security solutions. Although various efforts have been made in the literature, the usability aspects of the password selection process are not well understood or addressed in the context of end-user situational awareness. This research work specifies three security and usability-related strategies that represent the organizations’, the end users’ and the attackers’ objectives with regards to password construction. Understanding each actor’s perspective can greatly assist in increasing situational awareness with regards to the authentication controls usage and effectiveness. Furthermore, a case study is presented to evaluate if, and in what way, transparent password policies, that isolate users’ involvement can affect the perspective of the end-user with regards to the security situation. Results showed that the transparent approached utilized has created a negative situation, users were not aware and never dealt with changing or trying to alter default security settings, leaving their home network vulnerable to external attacks. Finally, initial recommendations are made to organizations that would like to implement and evaluate transparent authentication controls

Zone of Passions: a Queer Re-imagining of Cyprus’s “No Man’s Land”

Focusing on a selection of literary and critical texts, this article explores the Dead Zone as a space that is decidedly queer in its undecidability, unspeakability, and resistance to normalisation; a landscape where desire, apprehension, and memory play themselves out. Rereading this zone as queer space allows us imaginings of Cyprus beyond the normalising regimes of the island’s north and south. And, such re-reading also invites a reconceptualisation of the Dead Zone as a profoundly ambiguous geographical site, political space, and imaginary topos

Frequency Selective Buildings Through Frequency Selective Surfaces

This paper proposes the deployment of frequency selective surfaces (FSS) in indoor wireless environments and investigates their effect on radio wave propagation. FSS can be deployed to selectively confine radio propagation in indoor areas, by artificially increasing the radio transmission loss naturally caused by building walls. FSS can also be used to channel radio signals into other areas of interest. Simulations and measurements have been carried out in order to verify the frequency selectivity of the FSS. Practical considerations regarding the deployment of FSS on building walls and the separation distance between the FSS and the supporting wall have been also investigated. Finally, a controlled, small-scale indoor environment has been constructed and measured in an anechoic chamber in order to practically verify this approach through the usage of ray tracing techniques

Miscalculations: Decolonizing and Anti-Oppressive Discourses in Indigenous Mathematics Education

In North American mathematics education, many practitioners highlight a disparity in achievement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students, and claim that incorporating Indigenous perspectives in mathematics provides a more inclusive teaching approach. However, our analysis shows that there is a stream of North American practitioners who do not use anti-oppressive or decolonizing discourses, including those who claim to be motivated by social justice education. By avoiding or not emphasizing colonization, ongoing racism, and oppression in Indigenous mathematics education, these practitioners are perpetuating a false sense of the origins of inequality. Furthermore, the quest for Indigenous cultural connections in mathematics sometimes has consequences such as placing blame on Indigenous peoples for not being authorities on their cultures, perpetuating stereotypes, homogenizing Indigenous cultures while reducing their history and knowledge to superficial artifacts, and preserving a sense of the inferiority of Indigenous peoples when it comes to understanding and learning mathematics.

Identity-Making Through Cree Mathematizing

We describe mathematics classroom teaching practice in an urban Canadian prairie Cree-bilingual school using the term Cree mathematizing, which, to us, means (re)considering Euro-Western school mathematics from the perspectives of the Cree people engaging with the content. Cree mathematizing takes the form of classroom lessons in which mathematical terms are translated between English and Cree, shared through stories situated in time, place, and relationships, and contextualized by the experiences of the students and teachers. In terms of the narrative conception of identity-making, Cree mathematizing is a process of engaging in school mathematics that necessitates Cree educators and students to understand themselves as producing mathematics through their unique experiences and stories, making Cree mathematizing a partial representation of identity. We argue that Cree mathematizing is a subversive practice that challenges the ways Euro-Western school mathematics is taught as a culture-free, apolitical, and decontextualized endeavour that is devoid of human narratives of experience.    Keywords: Indigenous mathematics education, Indigenization, narrative inquiry, Aboriginal educationLe terme « mathématisation crie » est utilisé pour décrire les pratiques éducatives en classe de mathématiques d’une école bilingue crie située en région urbaine des Prairies canadiennes. Pour nous, cela signifie de (re)considérer les cours de mathématiques eurooccidentaux de la perspective des peuples cris qui s’impliquent dans leur contenu. Dans la classe, la « mathématisation crie » est enseignée sous forme de leçons dans lesquelles les termes mathématiques sont traduits de l’anglais au cri ; elles sont transmises par des histoires situées dans le temps et le lieu, caractérisées par des relations, et contextualisées par les expériences des étudiants et des enseignants. En ce qui concerne la conception narrative de l’identité personnelle, la « mathématisation crie » s’articule par un processus d’engagement dans les mathématiques qui demande des éducateurs et étudiants cris de se comprendre eux-mêmes en tant que producteurs de mathématiques influencés chacun par ses propres expériences et son histoire, faisant de celles-ci une représentation partielle de leur identité. Nous soutenons que la « mathématisation crie » est une pratique subversive remettant en question la manière euro-occidentale—sans référence culturelle, apolitique, décontextualisée et dépourvue de récits d’expériences humaines—d’enseigner les mathématiques.   Mots-clés : éducation autochtone en mathématiques, autochtonisation, recherche narrative,éducation des Autochtone