Biblio

When biometric databases grow larger, a security breach or leak can affect millions. In order to protect against such a threat, the use of encryption is a natural choice. However, a biometric identification attempt then requires the decryption of a potential huge database, making a traditional approach potentially unfeasible. The use of selective JPEG2000 encryption can reduce the encryption’s computational load and enable a secure storage of biometric sample data. In this paper we will show that selective encryption of face biometric samples is secure. We analyze various encoding settings of JPEG2000, selective encryption parameters on the "Labeled Faces in the Wild" database and apply several traditional and deep learning based face recognition methods.

The coupling of safety-relevant embedded- and cyber-space components to build Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) extends the functionality and quality in many business domains, while also creating new ones. Prime examples like Internet of Things and Industry 4.0 enable new technologies and extend the service capabilities of physical entities by building a universe of connected devices. In addition to higher complexity, the coupling of these heterogeneous systems results in many new challenges, which should be addressed by engineers and administrators. Here, security represents a major challenge, which may be well addressed in cyber-space engineering, but less in embedded system or CPS design. Although model-based engineering provides significant benefits for system architects, like reducing complexity and automated analysis, as well as being considered as standard methodology in embedded systems design, the aspect of security may not have had a major role in traditional engineering concepts. Especially the characteristics of CPS, as well as the coupling of safety-relevant (physical) components with high-scalable entities of the cyber-space domain have an enormous impact on the overall level of security, based on the introduced side effects and uncertainties. Therefore, we aim to define a model-based security-engineering framework, which is tailored to the needs of CPS engineers. Hereby, we focus on the actual modeling process, the evaluation of security, as well as quantitatively expressing security of a deployed CPS. Overall and in contrast to other approaches, we shift the engineering concepts on a semantic level, which allows to address the proposed challenges in CPS in the most efficient way.

Data value (DV) is a novel concept that is introduced as one of the Big Data phenomenon features. While continuing an investigation of the DV ontology and its relationship with the data quality (DQ) on the conceptual level, this paper researches possible applications and use of the DV in the practical design of security and privacy protection systems and tools. We present a novel approach to DV evaluation that maps DQ metrics into DV value. Developed methods allow DV and DQ use in a wide range of application domains. To demonstrate DQ and DV concept employment in real tasks we present two real-life scenarios. The first use case demonstrates the DV use in crowdsensing application design. It shows up how DV can be calculated by integrating various metrics characterizing data application functionality, accuracy, and security. The second one incorporates the privacy consideration into DV calculus by exploring the relationship between privacy, DQ, and DV in the defense against web-site fingerprinting in The Onion Router (TOR) networks. These examples demonstrate how our methods of the DV and DQ evaluation may be employed in the design of real systems with security and privacy consideration.

Web application services have gradually become an important support of Internet services, but are also facing increasingly serious security problems. It is extremely necessary to evaluate the security of Web application services to deal with attacks against them effectively. In this paper, in view of the characteristics of the current attack of Web application services, a Web security analysis model based on the kill chain is established, and the possible attacks against Web application services are analyzed in depth from the perspective of the kill chain. Then, the security of Web application services is evaluated in a quantitative manner. In this way, it can make up the defects of insufficient inspection by the existing security vulnerability model and the security specification of the tracking of Web application services, so as to realize the objective and scientific evaluation of the security state of Web application services.

One of the most important strength features of crypto-system's is the key space. As a result, whenever the system has more key space, it will be more resistant to attack. The weakest type of attack on the key space is Brute Force attack, which tests all the keys on the ciphertext in order to get the plaintext. But there are several strategies that can be considered by the attacker and cryptographer related to the selection of the right key with the lowest cost (time). Game theory is a mathematical theory that draws the best strategies for most problems. This research propose a new evaluation method which is employing game theory to draw best strategies for both players (cryptographer & attacker).

Attack graphs are a relatively new - at least, from the point of view of a practical usage - method for modeling multistage cyber-attacks. They allow to understand how seemingly unrelated vulnerabilities may be combined together by an attacker to form a chain of hostile actions that enable to compromise a key resource. An attack graph is also the starting point for providing recommendations for corrective actions that would fix or mask security problems and prevent the attacks. In the paper, we propose TAG, a topological attack graph analysis tool designed to support a user in a security evaluation and countermeasure selection. TAG employs an improved version of MulVAL inference engine, estimates a security level on the basis of attack graph and attack paths scoring, and recommends remedial actions that improve the security of the analyzed system.

With the increasing security threats to the information of Industrial Cyber-physical Control Systems, the quantitative assessment of security risk becomes an important basis of information security research. Based on fuzzy hierarchy analysis, this paper constructs the hierarchical model of industrial control system safety risk evaluation, and obtains the exact value of risk. Experimental results show that the proposed method can effectively quantify the control system risk, which provides a basis for industrial control system risk management decision.

MAC using a counter value in message authentication for in-vehicle network prevents replay attack. When synchronization deviation of the counter value occurs between the sender and receiver, a message cannot be authenticated correctly because the generated MACs are different. Thus, a counter synchronization method has been proposed. In addition, injection and replay attack of a synchronization message for the synchronization method have been performed. However, DoS attack on the synchronization method has not been conducted. This study performs DoS attack in order to evaluate security of the synchronization method. Experimental results reveal the vulnerability of the synchronization method against DoS attack.

Software Defined Networking (SDN) has introduced both innovative opportunities and additional risks in the computer networking. Among disadvantages of SDNs one can mention their susceptibility to vulnerabilities associated with both virtualization and the traditional networking. Selecting a proper controller for an organization may not be a trivial task as there is a variety of SDN controllers on the market and each of them may come with its own pros and cons from the security point of view. This research proposes a comprehensive methodology for organizations to evaluate security-related features available in SDN controllers. The methodology can serve as a guideline in the decisions related to SDN choice. The proposed security assessment follows a structured approach to evaluate each layer of the SDN architecture and each metrics defined in presented research has been matched with the security controls defined in NIST 800-53. Through the tests on actual controllers the paper provides an example on how the proposed methodology can be used to evaluate existing SDN solutions.

Searchable encryption will become more important as medical services intensify their use of big data and artificial intelligence. To use searchable encryption safely, the resistance of terminals with embedded searchable encryption to illegal attacks (tamper resistance) is extremely important. This study proposes a searchable encryption system embedded in terminals and evaluate the tamper resistance of the proposed system. This study also proposes attack scenarios and quantitatively evaluates the tamper resistance of the proposed system by performing experiments following the proposed attack scenarios.

Computer security has gained more and more attention in a public over the last years, since computer systems are suffering from significant and increasing security threats that cause security breaches by exploiting software vulnerabilities. The most efficient way to ensure the system security is to patch the vulnerable system before a malicious attack occurs. Besides the commonly-used push-type patch management, the pull-type patch management is also adopted. The main issues in the pull-type patch management are two-fold; when to check the vulnerability information and when to apply a patch? This paper considers the security patch management for a virtual machine (VM) based intrusion tolerant system (ITS), where the system undergoes the patch management with a periodic vulnerability checking strategy, and evaluates the system security from the availability aspect. A composite stochastic reward net (SRN) model is applied to capture the attack behavior of adversary and the defense behaviors of system. Two availability measures; interval availability and point-wise availability are formulated to quantify the system security via phase expansion. The proposed approach and metrics not only enable us to quantitatively assess the system security, but also provide insights on the patch management. In numerical experiments, we evaluate effects of the intrusion rate and the number of vulnerability checking on the system security.

Computational Intelligence (CI) algorithms/techniques are packaged in a variety of disparate frameworks/applications that all vary with respect to specific supported functionality and implementation decisions that drastically change performance. Developers looking to employ different CI techniques are faced with a series of trade-offs in selecting the appropriate library/framework. These include resource consumption, features, portability, interface complexity, ease of parallelization, etc. Considerations such as language compatibility and familiarity with a particular library make the choice of libraries even more difficult. The paper introduces MeetCI, an open source software framework for computational intelligence software design automation that facilitates the application design decisions and their software implementation process. MeetCI abstracts away specific framework details of CI techniques designed within a variety of libraries. This allows CI users to benefit from a variety of current frameworks without investigating the nuances of each library/framework. Using an XML file, developed in accordance with the specifications, the user can design a CI application generically, and utilize various CI software without having to redesign their entire technology stack. Switching between libraries in MeetCI is trivial and accessing the right library to satisfy a user's goals can be done easily and effectively. The paper discusses the framework's use in design of various applications. The design process is illustrated with four different examples from expert systems and machine learning domains, including the development of an expert system for security evaluation, two classification problems and a prediction problem with recurrent neural networks.

Underpinning the operation of Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer (P2P) network [1] that facilitates the execution of transactions by end users, as well as the transaction confirmation process known as bitcoin mining. The security of this P2P network is vital for the currency to function and subversion of the underlying network can lead to attacks on bitcoin users including theft of bitcoins, manipulation of the mining process and denial of service (DoS). As part of this paper the network protocol and bitcoin core software are analysed, with three bitcoin message exchanges (the connection handshake, GETHEADERS/HEADERS and MEMPOOL/INV) found to be potentially vulnerable to spoofing and use in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Possible solutions to the identified weaknesses and vulnerabilities are evaluated, such as the introduction of random nonces into network messages exchanges.

The purpose of this research is to propose a new mathematical model, designed to evaluate the security of cryptosystems. This model is a mixture of ideas from two basic mathematical theories, information theory and game theory. The role of information theory is assigning the model with security criteria of the cryptosystems. The role of game theory was to produce the value of the game which is representing the outcome of these criteria, which finally refers to cryptosystem's security. The proposed model support an accurate and mathematical way to evaluate the security of cryptosystems by unifying the criteria resulted from information theory and produce a unique reasonable value.

High-end vehicles incorporate about one hundred computers; physical and virtualized ones; self-driving vehicles even more. This allows a plethora of attack combinations. This paper demonstrates how to assess exploitability risks of vehicular on-board networks via automatically generated and analyzed attack graphs. Our stochastic model and algorithm combine all possible attack vectors and consider attacker resources more efficiently than Bayesian networks. We designed and implemented an algorithm that assesses a compilation of real vehicle development documents within only two CPU minutes, using an average of about 100 MB RAM. Our proof of concept "Security Analyzer for Exploitability Risks" (SAlfER) is 200 to 5 000 times faster and 40 to 200 times more memory-efficient than an implementation with UnBBayes1. Our approach aids vehicle development by automatically re-checking the architecture for attack combinations that may have been enabled by mistake and which are not trivial to spot by the human developer. Our approach is intended for and relevant for industrial application. Our research is part of a collaboration with a globally operating automotive manufacturer and is aimed at supporting the security of autonomous, connected, electrified, and shared vehicles.

Having an effective security level for Embedded System (ES), helps a reliable and stable operation of this system. In order to identify, if the current security level for a given ES is effective or not, we need a proactive evaluation for this security level. The evaluation of the security level for ESs is not straightforward process, things like the heterogeneity among the components of ES complicate this process. One of the productive approaches, which overcame the complexity of evaluation for Security, Privacy and Dependability (SPD) is the Multi Metrics (MM). As most of SPD evaluation approaches, the MM approach bases on the experts knowledge for the basic evaluation. Regardless of its advantages, experts evaluation has some drawbacks, which foster the need for less experts-dependent evaluation. In this paper, we propose a framework for security measurability as a part of security, privacy and dependability evaluation. The security evaluation based on Multi Metric (MM) approach as being an effective approach for evaluations, thus, we call it MM framework. The art of evaluation investigated within MM framework, based also on systematic storing and retrieving of experts knowledge. Using MM framework, the administrator of the ES could evaluate and enhance the S-level of their system, without being an expert in security.

security evaluation of cryptosystem is a critical topic in cryptology. It is used to differentiate among cryptosystems' security. The aim of this paper is to produce a new model for security evaluation of cryptosystems, which is a combination of two theories (Game Theory and Information Theory). The result of evaluation method can help researchers to choose the appropriate cryptosystems in Wireless Communications Networks such as Cognitive Radio Networks.

Blockchain is an integrated technology to ensure keeping record and process transactions with decentralized manner. It is thought as the foundation of future decentralized ecosystem, and collects much attention. However, the maturity of this technology including security of the fundamental protocol and its applications is not enough, thus we need more research on the security evaluation and verification of Blockchain technology This tutorial explains the current status of the security of this technology, its security layers and possibility of application of formal analysis and verification.

Clustering algorithms have become a popular tool in computer security to analyze the behavior of malware variants, identify novel malware families, and generate signatures for antivirus systems. However, the suitability of clustering algorithms for security-sensitive settings has been recently questioned by showing that they can be significantly compromised if an attacker can exercise some control over the input data. In this paper, we revisit this problem by focusing on behavioral malware clustering approaches, and investigate whether and to what extent an attacker may be able to subvert these approaches through a careful injection of samples with poisoning behavior. To this end, we present a case study on Malheur, an open-source tool for behavioral malware clustering. Our experiments not only demonstrate that this tool is vulnerable to poisoning attacks, but also that it can be significantly compromised even if the attacker can only inject a very small percentage of attacks into the input data. As a remedy, we discuss possible countermeasures and highlight the need for more secure clustering algorithms.

The factors that threaten electric power information network are analyzed. Aiming at the weakness of being unable to provide numerical value of risk, this paper presents the evaluation index system, the evaluation model and method of network security based on multilevel fuzzy comprehensive judgment. The steps and method of security evaluation by the synthesis evaluation model are provided. The results show that this method is effective to evaluate the risk of electric power information network.

Interconnected everyday objects, either via public or private networks, are gradually becoming reality in modern life - often referred to as the Internet of Things (IoT) or Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS). One stand-out example are those systems based on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). Fleets of such vehicles (drones) are prophesied to assume multiple roles from mundane to high-sensitive applications, such as prompt pizza or shopping deliveries to the home, or to deployment on battlefields for battlefield and combat missions. Drones, which we refer to as UAVs in this paper, can operate either individually (solo missions) or as part of a fleet (group missions), with and without constant connection with a base station. The base station acts as the command centre to manage the drones' activities; however, an independent, localised and effective fleet control is necessary, potentially based on swarm intelligence, for several reasons: 1) an increase in the number of drone fleets; 2) fleet size might reach tens of UAVs; 3) making time-critical decisions by such fleets in the wild; 4) potential communication congestion and latency; and 5) in some cases, working in challenging terrains that hinders or mandates limited communication with a control centre, e.g. operations spanning long period of times or military usage of fleets in enemy territory. This self-aware, mission-focused and independent fleet of drones may utilise swarm intelligence for a), air-traffic or flight control management, b) obstacle avoidance, c) self-preservation (while maintaining the mission criteria), d) autonomous collaboration with other fleets in the wild, and e) assuring the security, privacy and safety of physical (drones itself) and virtual (data, software) assets. In this paper, we investigate the challenges faced by fleet of drones and propose a potential course of action on how to overcome them.

Spam Filtering is an adversary application in which data can be purposely employed by humans to attenuate their operation. Statistical spam filters are manifest to be vulnerable to adversarial attacks. To evaluate security issues related to spam filtering numerous machine learning systems are used. For adversary applications some Pattern classification systems are ordinarily used, since these systems are based on classical theory and design approaches do not take into account adversarial settings. Pattern classification system display vulnerabilities (i.e. a weakness that grants an attacker to reduce assurance on system's information) to several potential attacks, allowing adversaries to attenuate their effectiveness. In this paper, security evaluation of spam email using pattern classifier during an attack is addressed which degrade the performance of the system. Additionally a model of the adversary is used that allows defining spam attack scenario.