D2Gen: A Decentralized Device Genome Based Integrity Verification Mechanism for Collaborative Intrusion Detection Systems

Collaborative Intrusion Detection Systems are considered an effective defense mechanism for large, intricate, and multilayered Industrial Internet of Things against many cyberattacks. However, while a Collaborative Intrusion Detection System successfully detects and prevents various attacks, it is possible that an inside attacker performs a malicious act and compromises an Intrusion Detection System node. A compromised node can inflict considerable damage on the whole collaborative network. For instance, when a malicious node gives a false alert of an attack, the other nodes will unnecessarily increase their security and close all of their services, thus, degrading the system’s performance. On the contrary, if the spurious node approves malicious traffic into the system, the other nodes would also be compromised. Therefore, to detect a compromised node in the network, this article introduces a device integrity check mechanism based on “Digital Genome.” In medical science, a genome refers to a set that contains all of the information needed to build and maintain an organism. Based on the same concept, the digital genome is computed over a device’s vital hardware, software, and other components. Hence, if an attacker makes any change in a node’s hardware and software components, the digital genome will change, and the compromised node will be easily detected. It is envisaged that the proposed integrity attestation protocol can be used in diverse Internet of Things and other information technology applications to ensure the legitimate operation of end devices. This study also proffers a comprehensive security and performance analysis of the proposed framework

ASSESSMENT OF FARMERS’ KNOWLEDGE REGARDING CHILD LABOR IN AGRICULTURE: A CASE STUDY OF COTTON GROWERS IN DISTRICT BAHAWALPUR

The work which affects the education, dignity and health of a child is known as child labor. It exists in agriculture sector of Pakistan mostly in the form of hazardous work. The main objective of the study was to investigate the degree of knowledge of cotton growers on child labor issue with special reference to Decent Work of International Labor Organization (ILO). The study was conducted in Bahawalpur district where Decent Work has been implemented by World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)-Pakistan since 2013 as a part of its Sustainable Agriculture Program. Three categories of farmers were identified among a total of 388 selected cotton growers i.e. Farmers having high level of awareness, farmers having basic level of awareness and farmers having no awareness of child labor. Farmers were also categorized into three groups on the basis of their land holding i.e. (Category ‘a’) 1-7 acres, (b) >7-20 acres and (c) >20-50 acres. The data was analyzed through descriptive statistical method. Among category ‘a’ 7.5%, 88.7% and 3.7% of the farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Among category ‘b’ 7.2%, 88.5% and4.2% farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Among category ‘c’ 5.8%, 90.2% and 3.9% farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Since there was a large proportion of those farmers who have only basic level of awareness on child labor among all the three land holding categories, therefore, there is a need to educate farmers on preventing child labor at their farms to promote sustainable cotton

Mitigation strategies against the phishing attacks : a systematic literature review

Phishing attacks are among the most prevalent attack mechanisms employed by attackers. The consequences of successful phishing include (and are not limited to) financial losses, impact on reputation, and identity theft. The paper presents a systematic literature review featuring 248 articles (from the beginning of 2018 until March 2023) across the main digital libraries to identify, (1) the existing mitigation strategies against phishing attacks, and the underlying technologies considered in the development of these strategies; (2) the most considered phishing vectors in the development of the mitigation strategies; (3) anti-phishing guidelines and recommendations for organizations and end-users respectively; and (4) gaps and open issues that exist in the state of the art. The paper advocates for the need to consider the abilities of human users during the design and development of the mitigation strategies as only technology-centric solutions will not suffice to cater to the challenges posed by phishing attacks

Defense Against Integrity and Privacy Attacks in The Internet of Things

University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology.The world is resorting to the Internet of Things for ease of control and monitoring of smart devices. The ubiquitous use of the Internet of Things ranges from Industrial Control Systems to e-Health, e-Commerce, smart cities, supply chain management, smart cars, and a lot more. Such reliance on the Internet of Things is resulting in a significant amount of data to be generated, collected, processed, and analyzed. The big data analytics is no doubt beneficial for business development. However, at the same time, numerous threats such as attacks on message and device integrity, the vulnerability of end-devices to malware attacks, physical compromise of devices, and threats to user data security and privacy pose a great danger to the sustenance of Internet of Things. Therefore, it is the need of the hour to develop a security mechanism for the Internet of Things systems to ensure the integrity and privacy of data being processed by these systems. This study thus endeavors to highlight most of the known threats at various layers of the Internet of Things architecture with a focus on the anatomy of some of the significant attacks. The research also construes a detailed attack methodology adopted by some of the most successful malware attacks on the Internet of Things, including Industrial Control Systems and Cyber Physical Systems. The study further infers an attack strategy of a Distributed Denial of Service attack through the Internet of Things botnet followed by requisite security measures. The illustration of attack methodologies is followed by a composite guideline for the development of an Internet of Things security framework based on industry best practices. Sequel to the Internet of Things threat modeling, this research investigates the use of blockchain technology to protect the Internet of Things against data integrity and privacy attacks. Hence, to arrive at intelligible conclusions, a systematic study of the peculiarities of the Internet of Things environment, including its security and performance requirements and progression in blockchain technologies, is carried out. Moreover, this thesis also identifies unique challenges to blockchain’s adoption in the Internet of Things and recommends a possible way forward. Based on a systematic and analytical review of blockchain technology, this study proposes a privacy-preserving and secure data sharing framework for smart cities. The proposed scheme preserves user data privacy by dividing the blockchain network into various channels, where every channel comprises a finite number of authorized organizations and processes a specific type of data such as health, smart car, smart energy, or financial details. Moreover, access to users’ data within a channel is controlled by embedding access control rules in the smart contracts. The devised solution also conforms to some of the essential requirements outlined in the European Union General Data Protection Regulation. Another important contribution of this work is the conception and design of a novel Internet of Things centric consensus protocol with the Internet of Things focused transaction validation rules. The proposed Proof-of-Honesty consensus protocol not only reduces the possibility of Byzantine behavior by block proposers (validator/mining nodes) during the consensus process but is also scalable with low communication complexity. It is believed that the proposed consensus protocol will prove to be a governing factor for the Internet of Things systems considering to adopt blockchain technology. Correspondingly, the main conclusion of this research and evaluation is that a sensibly selected and carefully designed blockchain-based IoT application can provide some assurance to the users concerning the security and privacy of their data. In this context, the focus should be on developing an IoT-centric consensus protocol with an intelligent misbehavior detection mechanism to detect and identify malicious miner/validator nodes. Moreover, validation of IoT devices’ integrity is also an open challenge that requires due attention

Blockchain-based Secure CIDS Operation

For large, intricate, and multi-layered networks like that of Industrial IoT, an individual instance of intrusion detection system cannot efficiently work against advanced attack strategies. The reason is that it would not be aware of the overall context, environment, and relevant incidents in other networks. This necessitates a collaborative intrusion detection system that allows multiple intrusion detection systems to communicate with each other and share information on emerging cyber-attack incidents. Thus, immunizing themselves and preventing the attack from escalating. However, the main challenge here is to manage the trust among the peers, where an insider attacker may input false attack signatures to the network, thus degrading the performance. Hence, we propose a blockchain-based trustfree collaborative intrusion detection system, in which threat alert messages will only be propagated in the network after network consensus

Phytochemical composition, antilipidemic and antihypercholestrolemic perspectives of Bael leaf extracts

Abstract Background In recent times, focus on plant research has improved all over the world and essential parts of plants provide bioactive compounds in human diet. The bael (Aegle marmelos) has enormous traditional uses in the treatment of chronic diarrhea, dysentery, peptic ulcers and as a laxative. The main focus of this study was characterization of bael leaf extract for its bioactive constituents, antihypercholestrolemic and antilipidemic perspectives. Methods After proximate composition of bael powder, the aqueous extract of bael leaf was used for phytochemical profiling (alkaloids, total phenolic content and total flavonoid content). Afterwards, normal rats group G0 was administrated basal diet while G1 and G2 normal rat groups were fed diets containing bael leaf extract 125 mg and 250 mg, respectively for consecutive 60 days. In a similar way, hyperlipidemic rats group Gh0 was administrated basal diet while Gh1 and Gh2 hyperlipidemic rat groups were fed diets containing bael leaf extract 125 mg and 250 mg, respectively for consecutive 60 days. The blood drawn on day 0, day 30 and day 60 was analyzed for serum parameters, such as total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low–density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides concentration and free and ester cholesterol. Results Bael leaf powder is a rich source of crude fiber (14.50 ± 0.10 g/100 g). Aqueous extract of bael leaf contains alkaloids (15.58 ± 0.05 mg/g), flavonoids (64.00 ± 0.05 mg/g), phenolics (30.34 ± 0.01 GAEmg/g). From the In vivo studies, the lowest weight gain was observed in group G2 and in Gh2 as compared to control of both groups. The decrease in serum TC for G1–15.06%, G2–17.27% while in Gh1–22.46% and Gh2–34.82% after day 60, respectively. The maximum decrease was observed in group G2 (− 14.33%) and in Gh2 (− 24.79%) for triglycerides after 60 days. For HDL-cholesterol, significant increase (11.20%) in G2 and (49.83%) in Gh2 was observed of after 60 days. A trend in decrease of serum LDL–cholesterol in G2 (− 9.63%) and in Gh2 (− 44.65%) was also observed at day 60, and − 19.05% and − 30.06% decrease was noted in G2 and Gh2, respectively and decreasing trend was observed in free and total cholesterol − 22.30% and − 81.49% for groups G2 and Gh2 after day 60. Conclusions The results of the present study demonstrated that the extract contents of bael leaf provide protective role against hypercholesterolemic and hyperlipidemic conditions

ASSESSMENT OF FARMERS’ KNOWLEDGE REGARDING CHILD LABOR IN AGRICULTURE: A CASE STUDY OF COTTON GROWERS IN DISTRICT BAHAWALPUR

The work which affects the education, dignity and health of a child is known as child labor. It exists in agriculture sector of Pakistan mostly in the form of hazardous work. The main objective of the study was to investigate the degree of knowledge of cotton growers on child labor issue with special reference to Decent Work of International Labor Organization (ILO). The study was conducted in Bahawalpur district where Decent Work has been implemented by World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)-Pakistan since 2013 as a part of its Sustainable Agriculture Program. Three categories of farmers were identified among a total of 388 selected cotton growers i.e. Farmers having high level of awareness, farmers having basic level of awareness and farmers having no awareness of child labor. Farmers were also categorized into three groups on the basis of their land holding i.e. (Category ‘a’) 1-7 acres, (b) >7-20 acres and (c) >20-50 acres. The data was analyzed through descriptive statistical method. Among category ‘a’ 7.5%, 88.7% and 3.7% of the farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Among category ‘b’ 7.2%, 88.5% and4.2% farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Among category ‘c’ 5.8%, 90.2% and 3.9% farmers had advance, basic and no awareness, respectively. Since there was a large proportion of those farmers who have only basic level of awareness on child labor among all the three land holding categories, therefore, there is a need to educate farmers on preventing child labor at their farms to promote sustainable cotton

Prvoprincipielních popis různých fází v Li2NH sloučeniny: elektronové struktury a optických vlastností

A hydrogen storage material can also be used as a potential and effective solid reducing agent in addition to its applications as an important energy carrier. The density function theory has been used to find the structural and optoelectronic properties of the Li2NH compound. The exchangecorrelation functional based GGA (generalized gradient approximation) is applied for calculating structural and optoelectronic properties. The expression for the formation is used to identify the stability, which is further confirmed by calculating the structural properties of Li2NH. The calculations of the band structure show that a direct band gap is present between the occupied Li and N orbitals. A deep analysis of the optical properties was performed under incident photon radiation at energies up to 14 eV. Our calculated refractive index n(0) and the static part of the dielectric constant ε2(0) are analogous to the experimental and other reported theoretical value