Enforcing email addresses privacy using tokens

We propose a system which allows users to monitor how their email addresses are used and how they spread over the Internet. This protects the privacy of the user and can reduce the spam phenomenon. Our solution does not require changes to the email infrastructure, can be set up by the end user on an individual basis and is compatible with any email client as long as emails are centralized on a server (e.g. an IMAP server). Nevertheless, it requires that people use email messaging quite differentl

Low Latency High Bandwidth Anonymous Overlay Network with Anonymous Routing

Most existing anonymous networks focus on providing strong anonymity for the price of having lower bandwidth, higher latency and degraded usability when compared with the conventional use of the Internet. They also often anonymize only a few specific applications. In this paper, we propose a new approach of constructing an anonymous network. The network consists of an overlay network, which provides anonymity to all applications running on top of it, and a routing protocol, which can be considered as an anonymized version of path vector routing. The protocol preserves the high performance characteristics of the path vector routing and also has the added advantage of hiding the overlay network topology. Our simulation results show that the expected latency of our approach is 50% better than that of existing systems. Besides the new anonymous routing protocol, this paper aims to provide the general overview of this new anonymous overlay network which may serve as the input for further research

Ontology for Future-robust Product Portfolio Evolution: A Basis for the Development of Models and Methods

The future-robust evolution of product portfolios is a key challenge for manufacturing companies. It requires the integration of strategic product planning and the understanding that products are developed in generations based on references following the SGE - System Generation Engineering theory. There is, though, a lack of consistent terminology that unites these topics and makes their concepts consistent. Their terms are used differently across industries, institutions, and companies. The resulting miscommunication leads to a loss of efficiency. Hence, a structured, interrelated terminology is needed. The paper contributes an ontology that delivers a unifying basis for the development of models and methods

Is the far border of the Local Void expanding?

According to models of evolution in the hierarchical structure formation scenarios, voids of galaxies are expected to expand. The Local Void (LV) is the closest large void, and it provides a unique opportunity to test observationally such an expansion. It has been found that the Local Group, which is on the border of the LV, is running away from the void center at ~260 km/s. In this study we investigate the motion of the galaxies at the far-side border of the LV to examine the presence of a possible expansion. We selected late-type, edge-on spiral galaxies with radial velocities between 3000 km/s and 5000 km/s, and carried out HI 21 cm line and H-band imaging observations. The near-infrared Tully-Fisher relation was calibrated with a large sample of galaxies and carefully corrected for Malmquist bias. It was used to compute the distances and the peculiar velocities of the LV sample galaxies. Among the 36 sample LV galaxies with good quality HI line width measurements, only 15 galaxies were selected for measuring their distances and peculiar velocities, in order to avoid the effect of Malmquist bias. The average peculiar velocity of these 15 galaxies is found to be -419+208-251 km/s, which is not significantly different from zero. Due to the intrinsically large scatter of Tully-Fisher relation, we cannot conclude whether there is a systematic motion against the center of the LV for the galaxies at the far-side boundary of the void. However, our result is consistent with the hypothesis that those galaxies at the far-side boundary have an average velocity of ~260 km/s equivalent to what is found at the position of the Local Group.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, and 4 tables. Accepted for publication in A&

DolphinAtack: Inaudible Voice Commands

Speech recognition (SR) systems such as Siri or Google Now have become an increasingly popular human-computer interaction method, and have turned various systems into voice controllable systems(VCS). Prior work on attacking VCS shows that the hidden voice commands that are incomprehensible to people can control the systems. Hidden voice commands, though hidden, are nonetheless audible. In this work, we design a completely inaudible attack, DolphinAttack, that modulates voice commands on ultrasonic carriers (e.g., f > 20 kHz) to achieve inaudibility. By leveraging the nonlinearity of the microphone circuits, the modulated low frequency audio commands can be successfully demodulated, recovered, and more importantly interpreted by the speech recognition systems. We validate DolphinAttack on popular speech recognition systems, including Siri, Google Now, Samsung S Voice, Huawei HiVoice, Cortana and Alexa. By injecting a sequence of inaudible voice commands, we show a few proof-of-concept attacks, which include activating Siri to initiate a FaceTime call on iPhone, activating Google Now to switch the phone to the airplane mode, and even manipulating the navigation system in an Audi automobile. We propose hardware and software defense solutions. We validate that it is feasible to detect DolphinAttack by classifying the audios using supported vector machine (SVM), and suggest to re-design voice controllable systems to be resilient to inaudible voice command attacks.Comment: 15 pages, 17 figure

Discovery of Highly Obscured Galaxies in the Zone of Avoidance

We report the discovery of twenty-five previously unknown galaxies in the Zone of Avoidance. Our systematic search for extended extra-galactic sources in the GLIMPSE and MIPSGAL mid-infrared surveys of the Galactic plane has revealed two overdensities of these sources, located around l ~ 47 and 55 degrees and |b| less than 1 degree in the Sagitta-Aquila region. These overdensities are consistent with the local large-scale structure found at similar Galactic longitude and extending from |b| ~ 4 to 40 degrees. We show that the infrared spectral energy distribution of these sources is indeed consistent with those of normal galaxies. Photometric estimates of their redshift indicate that the majority of these galaxies are found in the redshift range z = 0.01 - 0.05, with one source located at z = 0.07. Comparison with known sources in the local Universe reveals that these galaxies are located at similar overdensities in redshift space. These new galaxies are the first evidence of a bridge linking the large-scale structure between both sides of the Galactic plane at very low Galactic latitude and clearly demonstrate the feasibility of detecting galaxies in the Zone of Avoidance using mid-to-far infrared surveys.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal, 28 pages, 5 tables, 11 figure

The M33 Globular Cluster System with PAndAS Data: The Last Outer Halo Cluster?

We use CFHT/MegaCam data to search for outer halo star clusters in M33 as part of the Pan-Andromeda Archaeological Survey (PAndAS). This work extends previous studies out to a projected radius of 50 kpc and covers over 40 square degrees. We find only one new unambiguous star cluster in addition to the five previously known in the M33 outer halo (10 kpc <= r <= 50 kpc). Although we identify 2440 cluster candidates of various degrees of confidence from our objective image search procedure, almost all of these are likely background contaminants, mostly faint unresolved galaxies. We measure the luminosity, color and structural parameters of the new cluster in addition to the five previously-known outer halo clusters. At a projected radius of 22 kpc, the new cluster is slightly smaller, fainter and redder than all but one of the other outer halo clusters, and has g' ~ 19.9, (g'-i') ~ 0.6, concentration parameter c ~ 1.0, a core radius r_c ~ 3.5 pc, and a half-light radius r_h ~ 5.5 pc. For M33 to have so few outer halo clusters compared to M31 suggests either tidal stripping of M33's outer halo clusters by M31, or a very different, much calmer accretion history of M33.Comment: 37 pages, 9 figures. Accepted by the Astrophysical Journa

Experimental and Numerical aspects of B416 Cu-Be alloy friction stir process

The Friction Stir Processing is an innovative surface engineering method, considered as a green processing technique. A good physical understanding of the process can be reached by the combined efforts of experimental examination and numerical modelling. In this study numerical and experimental investigations of Friction Stir Process (FSP) have been carried out on samples of B194 ASTM copper-beryllium alloy. The behavior of this alloy under FSP was studied using an experiment design at three levels of transversal speed (maximum speed 80 mm/min), three different normal forces (maximum force 1250 N) and two levels of rotational speed: 1000 and 2000 rpm. The treated layers have been characterized in terms of hardness and microstructure. The results obtained have shown that FSP in the tested range of parameters leads to the formation of a stirred layer with fine grains and high hardness (approximately 260% higher that the initial value of the base material). The friction between the tool and the work piece generates heat around the tool and produces microstructure modification by homogenization and refinement. These factors play a crucial role in heat generation during the process. The heat generating mechanism is influenced by the process parameters (normal load, rotational speed, transverse speed and geometric data). Thus the present study has been carried out in order to investigate the coupled effects of process parameters and the tool geometry on the thermal behavior of B194 ASTM copper-beryllium alloy under friction stir process. Numerical analyses in terms of heat generation and temperature distribution were carried out and a three-dimensional heat transfer model for friction stir process is proposed in this paper

On the kinematics of the Local cosmic void

We collected the existing data on the distances and radial velocities of galaxies around the Local Void in the Aquila/Hercules to examine the peculiar velocity field induced by its underdensity. A sample of 1056 galaxies with distances measured from the Tip of the Red Giant Branch, the Cepheid luminosity, the SNIa luminosity, the surface brightness fluctuation method, and the Tully-Fisher relation has been used for this purpose. The amplitude of outflow is found to be ~300 km/s. The galaxies located within the void produce the mean intra-void number density about 1/5 of the mean external number density of galaxies. The void's population has a lower luminosity and a later morphological type with the medians: M_B = -15.7^m and T = 8 (Sdm), respectively.Comment: Version 1. 14 pages, 8 figures, 2 tables. Accepted to Astrophysics, Volume 54, Issue