Empirical study to fingerprint public malware analysis services

The evolution of malicious software (malware) analysis tools provided controlled, isolated, and virtual environments to analyze malware samples. Several services are found on the Internet that provide to users automatic system to analyze malware samples, as VirusTotal, Jotti, or ClamAV, to name a few. Unfortunately, malware is currently incorporating techniques to recognize execution onto a virtual or sandbox environment. When analysis environment is detected, malware behave as a benign application or even show no activity. In this work, we present an empirical study and characterization of automatic public malware analysis services. In particular, we consider 26 different services. We also show a set of features that allow to easily fingerprint these services as analysis environments. Finally, we propose a method to mitigate fingerprinting

Vision based behaviors for a legged robot

This article describes two vision-based behaviors designed for an autonomous legged robot. These behaviors have been designed in a modular way in order to be able to integrate them in an architecture named DSH (Dynamic Schema Hierarchies), which is also briefly described. These behaviors have been tested in office indoor environments and experiments carried out are also described in this paper. The platform used in these experiments carried out are also described in theis paper. The platform used in these experiments has been the Sony AIBO robot. The developed behaviors provide the robot with the follow wall and follow person capabilities, using as main sensor the robot on-board camer

Approaching the puzzle of the adjective

I show a way to solve Borer’s (2013) “puzzle of the adjective”: adjectives behave like derived words regarding some morphological phenomena and like roots regarding others. My key overarching assumption is that adjectives are in fact non-primitive, comprising an adposition and a nominal. Other assumptions, framed within a syntactic approach to morphology, include: a universal recursive hierarchy of lexical categories; the idea that categorizers are simple lexical items relating a span of the categorial hierarchy to an exponent; the assumption that lexically and morphologically conditioned allomorphy is sensitive to stretches of the syntactic representation, rather than to exponents; and a rather flexible lexicalization procedure, one syntactic representation being mappable to different combinations of lexical items

Location and locatum verbs revisited: Evidence from aspect and quantification

In this paper we claim that location and locatum verbs are grammatically different, contrary to some recent analyses (Mateu 2001; 2008; Harley 2005). While aspectual tests are known to distinguish both classes, we adduce new evidence from degree quantification tests pointing in the same direction. In particular, location verbs seem to be change-of-state verbs, and locatum verbs behave rather like degree achievements and unergative verbs of variable telicity. We claim that these differences must be accounted for in the syntactic representation of locative verbs. While location verbs involve an abstract bounded path, articulated through the combination of a Path preposition and a Place preposition, locatum verbs involve an abstract predicative preposition that allows for degree quantification of the root and contextually determined (a)telicity

Argument structure and argument realization

This chapter provides a critical survey of some of the most significant phenomena that show how the study of Romance languages can make a strong contribution to our current theoretical understanding of the principles and empirical generalizations relevant to argument structure and its realization. After defining the notion of argument structure, two different current theoretical approaches to the lexicon–syntax interface are briefly presented: the projectionist one, which is typically adopted in lexicalist frameworks, and the constructivist/neo-constructionist one, which is assumed in non-lexicalist frameworks. The selection of empirical phenomena made in this chapter includes a discussion of the well-known distinction among intransitive verbal predicates (unaccusatives vs unergatives) in the context of Romance linguistics, a review of the crucial role of the Romance clitic se in argument structure and argument realization, a survey of some relevant explorations of events of transferal based on the grammar of dative clitics as well as other aspects of dative-marked arguments in Romance languages, and, finally, a discussion of the prominent place that these languages occupy in the huge literature on Talmy’s lexicalization patterns together with an overview of several refinements made to his initial typology of motion events

Dynamics maps for long-term autonomy

Navigating is one of the most basic capabilities of mobile robots. For this task, robots usually represent the environment through maps. This paper reports on first results of a work focused on mapping dynamic environments to achieve a robust navigation for long-term operation. This approach builds a static map starting from the construction plans of a building. A long-term map is started from the static map, and updated when adding and removing furniture, or when doors are opened or closed. A short-term map represents dynamic obstacles such as people. This approach is appropriate for fast deployment and long-term operations in office or domestic environments, able to adapt to changes in the environment. We demonstrate the robustness of this approach in the RoboCup@home competition, where robots must navigate in an environment that changes during the tests

Human development and the 'explosion' of democracy Variations of regime change across 60 societies

'Recently scholars identified a global 'explosion' of democracy as a sharply distinctive period within Huntington's Third Wave of democratization. So far the role of modernization has not been analyzed with particular regard to this outstanding phase of democratization. Given that modernization has economic as well as cultural aspects, we test two prominent theses. First, we test Przeworski/ Limongi s claim that transitions to democracy do not derive from economic modernization. Using a graded measure of regime change, we present evidence to the contrary. Second, we test Inglehart's finding that modern mass attitudes play a negligable role in promoting regime change to democracy. To the contrary again, we show that one aspect of cultural modernization, mass-level liberty aspirations, has a positive impact on democratic change - even stronger than economic modernization. Third, we unfold the concept of Human Development to establish a more general argument on the causal mechanism in the modernization-democratization nexus. Our data cover 60 societies of the World Values Surveys, representing nearly 50 per cent of all regime changes in the world since 1972.' (author's abstract)'Juengere Forschungsarbeiten haben eine globale 'Explosion' der Demokratie identifiziert, die eine scharf eingegrenzte Periode innerhalb Huntingtons breiterer Definition der Dritten Demokratisierungswelle bildet. Mit Blick auf diese hervorstechende Demokratisierungsphase ist die Rolle von Modernisierungsfaktoren bisher noch nicht untersucht worden. Ausgehend davon, dass Modernisierung oekonomische und kulturelle Aspekte hat, pruefen die Autoren zwei prominente Thesen. Zunaechst testen sie Przeworski/ Limongis Behauptung, dass Regimewechsel zur Demokratie nicht von oekonomischer Modernisierung befoerdert werden. Unter Verwendung eines kontinuierlichen Masses fuer Regimewechsel kommen die Autoren zu einem gegenteiligen Ergebnis. Zum zweiten testen sie Ingleharts Befund, dass moderne Einstellungen der Buerger ebenfalls keine positive Wirkung auf Regimewechsel zur Demokratie haetten. Im Gegensatz auch zu diesem Befund kommen die Autoren zu dem Ergebnis, dass ein wesentlicher Aspekt kultureller Modernisierung, naemlich die Verbreitung von Freiheitsanspruechen, sehr wohl einen positiven Effekt auf Regimewechsel zur Demokratie hat - mehr noch sogar als oekonomische Modernisierung. Zum dritten entfalten die Autoren das Konzept der Humanentwicklung, um ein generelleres Verstaendnis der Wirkungszusammenhaenge im Modernisierungs-Demokratisierungs-Nexus zu etablieren. Ihre Daten decken 60 Gesellschaften aus den Weltwertestudien ab, auf die fast 50 Prozent aller Regimewechsel entfallen, die seit 1972 weltweit aufgetreten sind.' (Autorenreferat)German title: Humanentwicklung und die 'Explosion' der DemokratieAvailable from <a href=http://skylla.wz-berlin.de/pdf/2001/iii01-202.pdf target=NewWindow>http://skylla.wz-berlin.de/pdf/2001/iii01-202.pdf</a> / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman

Jornada sobre “Aprendizaje a lo largo de la vida: MOOCs y otras tecnologías: Acto de Apertura

El Director de la cátedra, Vicente Matellán, ha estado acompañado por José Angel Hermida, Rector de la ULE, Ramón Ángel Fernández, Director de la Escuela de Ingenierías, Mª Victoria Seco, Vicerrectora de Campus, Agustín Rajoy Feijóo, Concejal de Hacienda y Nuevas Tecnologías del Ayuntamiento de León, y Agustina Piedrabuena, en representación de Telefónica