Community care : the experiences of two South Asian communities in relation to caring for older people.

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:DXN012998 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

A smart contract system for decentralized borda count voting

In this article, we propose the first self-tallying decentralized e-voting protocol for a ranked-choice voting system based on Borda count. Our protocol does not need any trusted setup or tallying authority to compute the tally. The voters interact through a publicly accessible bulletin board for executing the protocol in a way that is publicly verifiable. Our main protocol consists of two rounds. In the first round, the voters publish their public keys, and in the second round they publish their randomized ballots. All voters provide Non-interactive Zero-Knowledge (NIZK) proofs to show that they have been following the protocol specification honestly without revealing their secret votes. At the end of the election, anyone including a third-party observer will be able to compute the tally without needing any tallying authority. We provide security proofs to show that our protocol guarantees the maximum privacy for each voter. We have implemented our protocol using Ethereum's blockchain as a public bulletin board to record voting operations as publicly verifiable transactions. The experimental data obtained from our tests show the protocol's potential for the real-world deployment

Model Selection Approach for Distributed Fault Detection in Wireless Sensor Networks

Sensor networks aim at monitoring their surroundings for event detection and object tracking. But, due to failure, or death of sensors, false signal can be transmitted. In this paper, we consider the problems of distributed fault detection in wireless sensor network (WSN). In particular, we consider how to take decision regarding fault detection in a noisy environment as a result of false detection or false response of event by some sensors, where the sensors are placed at the center of regular hexagons and the event can occur at only one hexagon. We propose fault detection schemes that explicitly introduce the error probabilities into the optimal event detection process. We introduce two types of detection probabilities, one for the center node, where the event occurs and the other one for the adjacent nodes. This second type of detection probability is new in sensor network literature. We develop schemes under the model selection procedure, multiple model selection procedure and use the concept of Bayesian model averaging to identify a set of likely fault sensors and obtain an average predictive error.Comment: 14 page

An Improved Scheduling Algorithm for Traveling Tournament Problem with Maximum Trip Length Two

The Traveling Tournament Problem(TTP) is a combinatorial optimization problem where we have to give a scheduling algorithm which minimizes the total distance traveled by all the participating teams of a double round-robin tournament maintaining given constraints. Most of the instances of this problem with more than ten teams are still unsolved. By definition of the problem the number of teams participating has to be even. There are different variants of this problem depending on the constraints. In this problem, we consider the case where number of teams is a multiple of four and a team can not play more than two consecutive home or away matches. Our scheduling algorithm gives better result than the existing best result for number of teams less or equal to 32

Method to secure data in the cloud while preserving summary statistics

In this paper we propose a method which will preserve sum- mary statistics of data organized in a two way table. We have shown that fully homomorphic encryption is a powerful solution. However it has a number of disadvantages which makes it impractical. We have proposed a Restricted homomorphic encryption method which uses Pailier encryp- tion and order preserving encryption. This new method can be used for practical purposes owing to it’s efficiency in terms of both speed and storage

A secure end-to-end verifiable e-voting system using zero knowledge based blockchain

In this paper, we present a cryptographic technique for an authenticated, end-to-end verifiable and secret ballot election. Voters should receive assurance that their vote is cast as intended, recorded as cast and tallied as recorded. The election system as a whole should ensure that voter coercion is unlikely, even when voters are willing to be influenced. Currently, almost all verifiable e-voting systems require trusted authorities to perform the tallying process. An exception is the DRE-i and DRE-ip system. The DRE-ip system removes the requirement of tallying authorities by encrypting ballot in such a way that the election tally can be publicly verified without decrypting cast ballots. However, the DRE-ip system necessitates a secure bulletin board (BB) for storing the encrypted ballot as without it the integrity of the system may be lost and the result can be compromised without detection during the audit phase. In this paper, we have modified the DRE-ip system so that if any recorded ballot is tampered by an adversary before the tallying phase, it will be detected during the tallying phase. In addition, we have described a method using zero knowledge based public blockchain to store these ballots so that it remains tamper proof. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first end-to-end verifiable Direct-recording electronic (DRE) based e-voting system using blockchain. In our case, we assume that the bulletin board is insecure and an adversary has read and write access to the bulletin board. We have also added a secure biometric with government provided identity card based authentication mechanism for voter authentication. The proposed system is able to encrypt ballot in such a way that the election tally can be publicly verified without decrypting cast ballots maintaining end-to-end verifiability and without requiring the secure bulletin board

Classification of Encryption Algorithms using Fisher’s Discriminant Analysis

Fisher’s Discriminant Analysis (FDA) is a method used in statistics and machine learning which can often lead to good classification between several populations by maximizing the separation between the populations. We will present some applications of FDA that discriminate between cipher texts in terms of a finite set of encryption algorithms. Specifically, we use ten algorithms, five each of stream and block cipher types. Our results display good classification with some of the features. In the present case we have little in terms of an existing standard; however, our limited study clearly shows that further exploration of this issue could be worthwhile

Critical Appraisal of Parameters for Successful Implementation of BRTS in India

Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS) is establishing itself as a new and sustainable solution to mass transit against the conventional transit systems in many cities across the globe as well as in India. Different BRTSs have adopted various case-specific solutions to make the system contextual to the place, user-friendly, strategic, technologically advanced, and ecologically sustainable. In most cases, the most favoured solution is governed by aspects related to available infrastructure, budgetary allocations, demand and behavioral patterns of passengers, and areas of focus. The paper makes a critical appraisal of various parameters contributing to the implementation of BRTS services across the world and applicability of the same in India. It also deals with how the application of a new transportation system affects the surrounding area and with the resulting various social and physical impacts. As a conclusion, this paper establishes that successful BRTS must combine proper station design, track design, maintained vehicles and running ways with backup infrastructure, educated and updated drivers and workforce, public cautiousness, and system-backed information technology. Further, it concludes that the institutional framework needs revamping in Indian scenario for successful implementation of BRTS projects