Design and Analysis of New Shuffle Encryption Schemes for Multimedia

Securing the contents of visual data and multimedia requires specific design consideration for use in different applications. The major issue with this type of data has been occurrence of redundancy, at various places particularly in images, which makes data values repetitive at several places. The focus of this paper is on design of new shuffling schemes that can efficiently destroy redundancy in the visual data ensuring its secured transmission and distribution over public networks. Different variants of these shuffling schemes will be used as pre-processing schemes on multimedia data values especially in light weight devices using images. Standard as well as chaotic permutation and substitution schemes together with S-box rotation have been used to shuffle and map the plain data into random uncorrelated values via various variants of the presented schemes. For further improving the security, the processed data is encrypted using a computationally fast algorithm in its normal mode of operation. Security analysis using different types of images show that the proposed schemes satisfy the parameters required for securing visual contents even with very high redundancy.Defence Science Journal, 2012, 62(1), pp.159-166, DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.14429/dsj.62.100

A Hybrid Computational Intelligence based Technique for Automatic Cryptanalysis of Playfair Ciphers

The Playfair cipher is a symmetric key cryptosystem-based on encryption of digrams of letters. The cipher shows higher cryptanalytic complexity compared to mono-alphabetic cipher due to the use of 625 different letter-digrams in encryption instead of 26 letters from Roman alphabets. Population-based techniques like Genetic algorithm (GA) and Swarm intelligence (SI) are more suitable compared to the Brute force approach for cryptanalysis of cipher because of specific and unique structure of its Key Table. This work is an attempt to automate the process of cryptanalysis using hybrid computational intelligence. Multiple particle swarm optimization (MPSO) and GA-based hybrid technique (MPSO-GA) have been proposed and applied in solving Playfair ciphers. The authors have attempted to find the solution key applied in generating Playfair crypts by using the proposed hybrid technique to reduce the exhaustive search space. As per the computed results of the MPSO-GA technique, correct solution was obtained for the Playfair ciphers of 100 to 200 letters length. The proposed technique provided better results compared to either GA or PSO-based technique. Furthermore, the technique was also able to recover partial English text message for short Playfair ciphers of 80 to 120 characters length

HeW: AHash Function based on Lightweight Block Cipher FeW

A new hash function HeW: A hash function based on light weight block cipher FeW is proposed in this paper. The compression function of HeW is based on block cipher FeW. It is believed that key expansion algorithm of block cipher slows down the performance of the overlying hash function. Thereby, block ciphers become a less favourable choice to design a compression function. As a countermeasure, we cut down the key size of FeW from 80-bit to 64-bit and provide a secure and efficient key expansion algorithm for the modified key size. FeW based compression function plays a vital role to enhance the efficiency of HeW. We test the hash output for randomness using the NIST statistical test suite and test the avalanche effect, bit variance and near collision resistance. We also give the security estimates of HeW against differential cryptanalysis, length extension attack, slide attack and rotational distinguisher.

Improving Cryptography Based On Entropoids

Entropic quasigroups or entropoids provide an attractive option for development of post-quantum cryptographic schemes. We elaborate on the mathematical properties of entropoids with modifications in the initial operation. The starting entropic quasigroups obtained by this process can be applied to generate higher-order structures suitable for cryptography. We also propose an encryption/decryption scheme analogous to the ElGamal scheme with quasigroup string transformations in the entropoid setting. We then move on to enumerate important properties that are beneficial in cryptographic use together with algorithms for their verification

Branding strategies for real estate companies in Delhi-NCR

Real estate is one of the fastest growing industries in India mainly due to rising population and income, movement of people to larger cities & towns and increasing demand-supply gap. Many Indian and foreign companies have started investing heavily in this sector as bright prospects can be witnessed in metro and big cities as well as smaller towns in India. Major players like DLF, Unitech, Ansals, Omaxe and Parsavnath Developers have shown good turnover in recent times and many others are in the process of establishing themselves in this business. With New Delhi being the national capital of India, this region provides variety of opportunities to people from different parts of the country. Properties ranging from one bedroom residential flats to lavish bungalows and from small shops and offices to large commercial spaces and business centers are all in demand. The number of real estate and construction companies in this region has also increased drastically, thereby increasing competition amongst them. Different companies have started adopting unique and innovative marketing strategies for attracting different categories of customers in this region. This paper first analyzes existing marketing strategies that are adopted by popular real estate firms for addressing different customer segments and then suggests newer ones to attract business from investors and buyers in the Delhi - National Capital Region (NCR) for residential purpose. Secondary information from various sources was used and primary information was collected by interacting with real estate developers and different categories of customers. Innovative applications of Information Technology in this industry are also portrayed in this paper

Impact of make-in-India campaign on foreign investors towards FDI in India

Make in India is not just an arousing call for investors, to contribute their serving into the developing economy of India, but a pledge to stimulate the development of manufacturing sector of the country. The major aim of this paper is to discover the determining factors of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), persuading investors to come and investment in India. This paper deals with primary aspects of Make in India campaign and Foreign Direct Investment. In this study, the dependent variable is Foreign Direct Investment and Independent variables are the determinants impacting FDI (market size, GDP, openness of the economy, labor cost and productivity, tax policies, infrastructure, foreign exchange rate, political stability and government regulations). According to the results, this study reveals the positive impact of Make in India campaign and variables impacting FDI for enhancing the domestic wealth of the nation and upholding the pace of progression and advancement. It will be useful for various stakeholders to understand the viewpoints of various investors from different countries looking forward to invest in India

Smart phones, smarter marketing: suggesting strategies through smart phones in India

Marketing via mobile phones, commonly known as Mobile (m)-Marketing, includes advertising, promotions, direct marketing and customer relationship management using mobile calls or mobile media like SMS and MMS. With over two billion mobile users currently available all over the world and a significant percentage switching to smart phones, marketers now have new opportunities to target users of such devices. This paper focuses on identifying and designing marketing strategies for different sectors and product/service categories in India using these smart devices and available services. Primary data collection has been carried out by interviewing marketing and store managers and also by collecting responses from users. We identify sectors like banking & financial services, education, health, real estate, airlines, tourism and hospitality and suggest interesting marketing opportunities for the mobile platform. We believe that these initiatives would open up new channels for customer engagement, branding, advertising and product promotion. We also feel that with regular addition of new players, the future holds bright for brands coming together, selling together and marketing together in the smartest possible way

Converting apprehensive customers to willing customers

This study focuses on knowing about the factors that can affect the trust levels of the consumers involved in online shopping. Trust has been identified as a prominent factor that ultimately leads to the transformation of the apprehensive customers into willing customers. The role of website design features and portal affiliation is tested regarding their impact in affecting the trusting beliefs of the customers. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was put to use to do the statistical testing on the data collected through students of tier III city of India. The results showed that the website design features have an important role to play in affecting the trusting beliefs of the people whereas portal affiliation didn’t have much of a role. The study implies that the website managers must focus on their design features if they want to gain the trust of their customers. The portal affiliation wouldn’t be fruitful in the case of a student at least. Better shoppers amongst students must be attracted towards portals through innovative designs and features