Information Security Commons^™

Obfuscation At-Source: Privacy In Context-Aware Mobile Crowd-Sourcing, Thivya Kandappu, Archan Misra, Shih-Fen Cheng, Randy Tandriansyah, Hoong Chuin Lau

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

By effectively reaching out to and engaging larger population of mobile users, mobile crowd-sourcing has become a strategy to perform large amount of urban tasks. The recent empirical studies have shown that compared to the pull-based approach, which expects the users to browse through the list of tasks to perform, the push-based approach that actively recommends tasks can greatly improve the overall system performance. As the efficiency of the push-based approach is achieved by incorporating worker's mobility traces, privacy is naturally a concern. In this paper, we propose a novel, 2-stage and user-controlled obfuscation technique that provides a trade off-amenable …

Tactful Inattention: Erving Goffman, Privacy In The Digital Age, And The Virtue Of Averting One's Eyes, Elizabeth De Armond

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Smartphone User Privacy Preserving Through Crowdsourcing, Bahman Rashidi

Theses and Dissertations

In current Android architecture, users have to decide whether an app is safe to use or not. Expert users can make savvy decisions to avoid unnecessary private data breach. However, the majority of regular users are not technically capable or do not care to consider privacy implications to make safe decisions. To assist the technically incapable crowd, we propose a permission control framework based on crowdsourcing. At its core, our framework runs new apps under probation mode without granting their permission requests up-front. It provides recommendations on whether to accept or not the permission requests based on decisions from peer …

Privacy In Iot Cloud, Aftab Ahmad, Ravi Mukkamala, Karthik Navuluri

Computer Science Faculty Publications

We present a framework for privacy preservation in an information cloud of IoT devices. We contend that privacy provisioning should be located in the user device and must protect the user, the information, and the device from breaches in privacy. We elaborate on how the layered privacy model can ensure such privacy provisioning, and justify the device being the provisioning point instead of the cloud alone. We present the point of view that, due to resource limitations of the IoT devices in general, the privacy preserving measures need to be hard-coded in the device technology. We fall short of suggesting …

Secure Server-Aided Top-K Monitoring, Yujue Wang, Hwee Hwa Pang, Yanjiang Yang, Xuhua Ding

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In a data streaming model, a data owner releases records or documents to a set of users with matching interests, in such a way that the match in interest can be calculated from the correlation between each pair of document and user query. For scalability and availability reasons, this calculation is delegated to third-party servers, which gives rise to the need to protect the integrity and privacy of the documents and user queries. In this paper, we propose a server-aided data stream monitoring scheme (DSM) to address the aforementioned integrity and privacy challenges, so that the users are able to …

Towards Secure Data Flow Oriented Multi-Vendor Ict Governance Model, Lars Magnusson, Patrik Elm, Anita Mirijamdotter

UBT International Conference

Today, still, ICT Governance is being regarded as a departmental concern, not an overall organizational concern. History has shown us that implementation strategies, which are based on departments, results in fractional implementations leading to ad hoc solutions with no central control and stagnation for the in-house ICT strategy. Further, this recently has created an opinion trend; many are talking about the ICT department as being redundant, a dying out breed, which should be replaced by on-demand specialized external services. Clearly, the evermore changing surroundings do force organizations to accelerate the pace of new adaptations within their ICT plans, more vivacious …

Analysis Of Security In Big Data Related To Healthcare, Isabel De La Torre, Begoña García-Zapirain, Miguel López-Coronado

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

Big data facilitates the processing and management of huge amounts of data. In health, the main information source is the electronic health record with others being the Internet and social media. Health-related data refers to storage in big data based on and shared via electronic means. Why are criminal organisations interested in this data? These organisations can blackmail people with information related to their health condition or sell the information to marketing companies, etc. This article analyses healthcare-related big data security and proposes different solutions. There are different techniques available to help preserve privacy such as data modification techniques, cryptographic …

Security And The Transnational Information Polity, Michael M. Losavio, Adel Said Elmaghraby

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

Global information and communications technologies create criminal opportunities in which criminal violation and physical proximity are decoupled. As in all our endeavors, the good become the prey of the bad. Murderous and venal exploitation of ICT has followed from the inception of the Internet, threatening all the good it brings and the trust we need so badly as a people. As the work continues to expand the implementation of Smart Cities and the Internet of Things, there will be more opportunities for exploitation of these technologies. We examine the social and liberty risks our data and technology-driven responses may entail.

A Longitudinal Study Of Privacy Awareness In The Digital Age And The Influence Of Knowledge, Therese L. Williams

Theses and Dissertations

Privacy, in the modern connected world, has become a much discussed topic in society ranging from privacy concerns to impacts, attitudes, practices and technologies. In today’s environment of vast social media and revelations of government spying, personal privacy is being highlighted as either non-existent or something that can be achieved to different degrees with knowledge or awareness of how our private information is collected and used. This research strives to answer the question "Using Alan Westin's privacy categories, what is the general awareness of privacy issues in social media and smartphone usage and how does it change when knowledge is …

Breaking Into The Vault: Privacy, Security And Forensic Analysis Of Android Vault Applications, Xiaolu Zhang, Ibrahim Baggili, Frank Breitinger

Electrical & Computer Engineering and Computer Science Faculty Publications

In this work we share the first account for the forensic analysis, security and privacy of Android vault applications. Vaults are designed to be privacy enhancing as they allow users to hide personal data but may also be misused to hide incriminating files. Our work has already helped law enforcement in the state of Connecticut to reconstruct 66 incriminating images and 18 videos in a single criminal case. We present case studies and results from analyzing 18 Android vault applications (accounting for nearly 220 million downloads from the Google Play store) by reverse engineering them and examining the forensic artifacts …

Cyber Security For Everyone: An Introductory Course For Non-Technical Majors, Marc J. Dupuis

Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice

In this paper, we describe the need for and development of an introductory cyber security course. The course was designed for non-technical majors with the goal of increasing cyber security hygiene for an important segment of the population—college undergraduates. While the need for degree programs that focus on educating and training individuals for occupations in the ever-growing cyber security field is critically important, the need for improved cyber security hygiene from the average everyday person is of equal importance. This paper discusses the approach used, curriculum developed, results from two runs of the course, and frames the overall structure of …

Malware Analysis And Privacy Policy Enforcement Techniques For Android Applications, Aisha Ibrahim Ali-Gombe

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The rapid increase in mobile malware and deployment of over-privileged applications over the years has been of great concern to the security community. Encroaching on user’s privacy, mobile applications (apps) increasingly exploit various sensitive data on mobile devices. The information gathered by these applications is sufficient to uniquely and accurately profile users and can cause tremendous personal and financial damage.

On Android specifically, the security and privacy holes in the operating system and framework code has created a whole new dynamic for malware and privacy exploitation. This research work seeks to develop novel analysis techniques that monitor Android applications for …

Ispy: Threats To Individual And Institutional Privacy In The Digital World, Lori Andrews

All Faculty Scholarship

What type of information is collected, who is viewing it, and what law librarians can do to protect their patrons and institutions.

Lightweight Three-Factor Authentication And Key Agreement Protocol For Internet-Integrated Wireless Sensor Networks, Qi Jiang, Sherali Zeadally, Jianfeng Ma, Debiao He

Information Science Faculty Publications

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) will be integrated into the future Internet as one of the components of the Internet of Things, and will become globally addressable by any entity connected to the Internet. Despite the great potential of this integration, it also brings new threats, such as the exposure of sensor nodes to attacks originating from the Internet. In this context, lightweight authentication and key agreement protocols must be in place to enable end-to-end secure communication. Recently, Amin et al. proposed a three-factor mutual authentication protocol for WSNs. However, we identified several flaws in their protocol. We found that their …

Are The Trade-Offs For Reducing Cross-Border Cybercrime Manageable?, Steven Mark Miller, Qiu-Hong Wang, Robert John Kauffman

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Without increased government intervention andgovernment-industry collaboration, the advantages inherent in the next wave ofInternet-enabled digital transformation will increasingly tilt towardcyber criminals, and their influence will disproportionately increase. The dilemma that immediately presents itself in such ascenario, however, is that an increased level of government involvement canalso lead to undesirable consequences. Increasing security always comes withtrade-offs that must be managed. The obvious concerns relate to the erosion ofprivacy, illegal or extralegal persecution, the abuse of Internet censorshipand the impediment to or stifling of innovation.

The Gdpr As A Chance To Break Down Borders, Fred H. Cate, Christopher Kuner, Dan Jerker B. Svantesson, Orla Lynskey, Nora Ni Loideain

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Assessment Of Security Vulnerabilities In Wearable Devices, Brian Cusack, Bryce Antony, Gerard Ward, Shaunak Mody

Australian Information Security Management Conference

Wearable devices have proliferated in usage and human experience, and they provide convenience for personal information requirements. These devices are both sensory and immersive for the diverse global network that is generally termed the Internet of things (IoT). The immediacy of the two-way communication created in the IoT has made vulnerable human behaviour and raised debate around information ownership and privacy expectations. The legitimacy of ownership of information and its reuse are prevalent problems. In this research, we tested four wearable devices that share 44% of the current market, for security vulnerabilities. We found serious weaknesses that could result in …

Personal Privacy: A Study To Determine Views On Privacy As It Relates To Technology Acceptance, Keith A. Wuotinen

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This descriptive correlation study sought to learn the relationships, if any, between a person’s concern for privacy and their acceptance of technology, in conjunction with the control factors of the Big Five personality factors. The study employed a modified Concern for Information Privacy (CFIP) scale and a modified Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) approach in conjunction with the Big Five personality factors using a 51-question survey.

The study surveyed students at Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan, who were enrolled in the College of Technology. The results indicated that there was a significant positive relationship between the CFIP and the TAM. …

One-Round Strong Oblivious Signature-Based Envelope, Rongmao Chen, Yi Mu, Willy Susilo, Guomin Yang, Fuchun Guo, Mingwu Zhang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Oblivious Signature-Based Envelope (OSBE) has been widely employed for anonymity-orient and privacy-preserving applications. The conventional OSBE execution relies on a secure communication channel to protect against eavesdroppers. In TCC 2012, Blazy, Pointcheval and Vergnaud proposed a framework of OSBE (BPV-OSBE) without requiring any secure channel by clarifying and enhancing the OSBE security notions. They showed how to generically build an OSBE scheme satisfying the new strong security in the standard model with a common-reference string. Their framework requires 2-round interactions and relies on the smooth projective hash function (SPHF) over special languages, i.e., languages from encryption of signatures. In this …

Exploring Privacy Leakage From The Resource Usage Patterns Of Mobile Apps, Amin Rois Sinung Nugroho

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Due to the popularity of smart phones and mobile apps, a potential privacy risk with the usage of mobile apps is that, from the usage information of mobile apps (e.g., how many hours a user plays mobile games in each day), private information about a user’s living habits and personal activities can be inferred. To assess this risk, this thesis answers the following research question: can the type of a mobile app (e.g., email, web browsing, mobile game, music streaming, etc.) used by a user be inferred from the resource (e.g., CPU, memory, network, etc.) usage patterns of the mobile …

Anonymous Proxy Signature With Hierarchical Traceability, Jiannan Wei, Guomin Yang, Yi Mu, Kaitai Liang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Anonymous proxy signatures are very useful in the construction of anonymous credential systems such as anonymous voting and anonymous authentication protocols. As a basic requirement, we should ensure an honest proxy signer is anonymous. However, in order to prevent the proxy signer from abusing the signing right, we should also allow dishonest signers to be traced. In this paper, we present three novel anonymous proxy signature schemes with different levels of (namely, public, internal and original signer) traceability. We define the formal definitions and security models for these three different settings, and prove the security of our proposed schemes under …

A Cyber Forensics Needs Analysis Survey: Revisiting The Domain's Needs A Decade Later, Vikram S. Harichandran, Frank Breitinger, Ibrahim Baggili, Andrew Marrington

Electrical & Computer Engineering and Computer Science Faculty Publications

The number of successful cyber attacks continues to increase, threatening financial and personal security worldwide. Cyber/digital forensics is undergoing a paradigm shift in which evidence is frequently massive in size, demands live acquisition, and may be insufficient to convict a criminal residing in another legal jurisdiction. This paper presents the findings of the first broad needs analysis survey in cyber forensics in nearly a decade, aimed at obtaining an updated consensus of professional attitudes in order to optimize resource allocation and to prioritize problems and possible solutions more efficiently. Results from the 99 respondents gave compelling testimony that the following …

A Privacy Gap Around The Internet Of Things For Open-Source Projects, Brian Cusack, Reza Khaleghparast

Australian Information Security Management Conference

The Internet of Things (IoT) is having a more important role in the everyday lives of people. The distribution of connectivity across social and personal interaction discloses personalised information and gives access to a sphere of sensitivities that were previously masked. Privacy measures and security to protect personal sensitivities are weak and in their infancy. In this paper we review the issue of privacy in the context of IoT open-source projects, and the IoT security concerns. A proposal is made to create a privacy bubble around the interoperability of devices and systems and a filter layer to mitigate the exploitation …

New Secure Solutions For Privacy And Access Control In Health Information Exchange, Ahmed Fouad Shedeed Ibrahim

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

In the current digital age, almost every healthcare organization (HCO) has moved from storing patient health records on paper to storing them electronically. Health Information Exchange (HIE) is the ability to share (or transfer) patients’ health information between different HCOs while maintaining national security standards like the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996. Over the past few years, research has been conducted to develop privacy and access control frameworks for HIE systems. The goal of this dissertation is to address the privacy and access control concerns by building practical and efficient HIE frameworks to secure the sharing …

A Forensic Examination Of Several Mobile Device Faraday Bags & Materials To Test Their Effectiveness, Ashleigh Lennox-Steele, Alastair Nisbet

Australian Digital Forensics Conference

A Faraday bag is designed to shield a mobile phone or small digital device from radio waves entering the bag and reaching the device, or to stop radio waves escaping through the bag from the device. The effectiveness of these shields is vital for security professionals and forensic investigators who seize devices and wish to ensure that their contents are not read, modified or deleted prior to a forensic examination. This research tests the effectiveness of several readily available Faraday bags. The Faraday bags tested are all available through online means and promise complete blocking of all signals through the …

A Survey Of Social Media Users Privacy Settings & Information Disclosure, Mashael Aljohani, Alastair Nisbet, Kelly Blincoe

Australian Information Security Management Conference

This research utilises a comprehensive survey to ascertain the level of social networking site personal information disclosure by members at the time of joining the membership and their subsequent postings to the sites. Areas examined are the type of information they reveal, their level of knowledge and awareness regarding how their information is protected by SNSs and the awareness of risks that over-sharing may pose. Additionally, this research studies the effect of gender, age, education, and level of privacy concern on the amount and kind of personal information disclosure and privacy settings applied. A social experiment was then run for …

In The Wild Residual Data Research And Privacy, William Bradley Glisson, Tim Storer, Andrew Blyth, George Grispos, Matt Campbell

Interdisciplinary Informatics Faculty Publications

As the world becomes increasingly dependent on technology, researchers in both industry and academia endeavor to understand how technology is used, the impact it has on everyday life, the artifact life-cycle and overall integrations of digital information. In doing so, researchers are increasingly gathering ‘real- world’ or ‘in-the-wild’ residual data, obtained from a variety of sources, without the explicit consent of the original owners. This data gathering raises significant concerns regarding privacy, ethics and legislation, as well as practical considerations concerning investigator training, data storage, overall security and data disposal. This research surveys recent studies of residual data gathered in-the-wild …

In-The-Wild Residual Data Research And Privacy, William B. Glisson, Tim Storer, Andrew Blyth, George Grispos, Matt Campbell

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

As the world becomes increasingly dependent on technology, researchers in both industry and academia endeavor to understand how technology is used, the impact it has on everyday life, the artifact life-cycle and overall integrations of digital information. In doing so, researchers are increasingly gathering 'real-world' or 'in-the-wild' residual data, obtained from a variety of sources, without the explicit consent of the original owners. This data gathering raises significant concerns regarding privacy, ethics and legislation, as well as practical considerations concerning investigator training, data storage, overall security and data disposal. This research surveys recent studies of residual data gathered in-the-wild and …

Survey On Remnant Data Research: The Artefacts Recovered And The Implications In A Cyber Security Conscious World, Michael James, Patryk Szewczyk

Australian Digital Forensics Conference

The prevalence of remnant data in second hand storage media is well documented. Since 2004 there have been ten separate papers released through Edith Cowan University alone. Despite numerous government agencies providing advice on securing personal and corporate information, and news articles highlighting the need for data security, the availability of personal and confidential data on second hand storage devices is continuing, indicating a systemic laissez faire attitude to data security, even in our supposedly cyber security conscious world. The research continues, but there seems to be a lack of correlation of these studies to identify trends or common themes …

Steganography, Naresh Emmadi, Varun Kumar Kattekolu, Sudhakar Shamul

All Capstone Projects

Multi Layer Security (MLS) is the art of hiding the fact that communication is taking place, by hiding information in other information. Many different carrier file formats can be used, but digital images are the most popular because of their frequency on the internet. For hiding secret information in images, there exists a large variety of techniques some are more complex than others and all of them have respective strong and weak points. Different applications may require absolute invisibility of the secret information, while others require a large secret message to be hidden. This project report intends to give an …