Cyberinfrastructure Research Articles

Ensuring the Stability of Cyber Defense of the State in the Conditions of Armed Conflict

The article is devoted to the problem of sustainability of cyber defense of national security in the context of modern armed conflicts. The work examines key aspects that pose a threat to the state's cyber security, including cyber attacks, cyber espionage and cyber sabotage. The article analyzes the need for the development of cyber infrastructure, personnel training and a crisis plan for recovery after a cyber attack. It also examines the role of government institutions in ensuring cyber security, including regulatory development and cooperation with the private sector and academic institutions. In addition, the article highlights the international aspect of cyber defense resilience and the importance of cooperation between states and compliance with international norms and rules in cyberspace. The work ends with conclusions about the importance of joint efforts of national and international public structures to ensure sustainable cyber security in the conditions of armed conflicts.

ADMINISTRATIVE AND LEGAL BASIS FOR AUTHORIZING SECURITY AND DEFENSE SECTOR BODIES TO ORGANIZE CYBER TO INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES

In a hybrid war, the winner is the party that first creates conditions for violating the target function of the operability of the information security system and cybersecurity of critical information infrastructure facilities. To create prerequisites for a violation of the target function, it is necessary to identify vulnerabilities in the information security system and cybersecurity of enemy critical information infrastructure facilities in advance. This task is performed during Cyber to Intelligence. For a long time, the concept of cyber to intelligence was absent from scientific research, but the activity as such was already carried out in the context of cyber intelligence. Only in 2021, at the legislative level, it was adopted to understand cyber to intelligence as activities aimed at identifying vulnerabilities in software, telecommunications equipment, automated control systems for forces, weapons and/or technological processes of a certain target (cyber infrastructure object). The subject of research in the scientific article is the justification of the administrative and legal foundations of the organization of cyber to intelligence. To achieve the goal and the set task, theoretical research methods were used: generalization of scientific literature; structural and genetic analysis when clarifying the object and subject of research; analytical and comparative analysis when evaluating the novelty of research results; generalization-for formulating conclusions and recommendations. The research results are obtained, the scientific novelty of which consists in summarizing information about a new type of cyber to intelligence activity, a schematic description of the activity process is presented, and the most likely authorized bodies (subjects) for its implementation are identified. The components of cyber intelligence and stages of cyber intelligence are proposed. Prospects for further research in this area. The presented study does not exhaust all aspects of this problem. The theoretical results obtained in the course of scientific research form the basis for further justification of the formalized form for conducting cyber to intelligence.

Cyber-enabled autocalibration of hydrologic models to support Open Science

Automatic calibration (autocalibration) of models is a standard practice in hydrologic sciences. However, hydrologic modelers, while performing autocalibrations, spend considerable amount of time in data pre-processing, coding, and running simulations rather than focusing on science questions. Such inefficiency, as this paper outlines, stems from: (i) platform dependence, (ii) limited computational resource, (iii) limited programming literacy, (iv) limited model structure and source code literacy, and (v) lack of data-model interoperability in the so-called autocalibration process. By expanding and enhancing an existing web-based modeling platform SWATShare, developed for the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) hydrologic model, this paper demonstrates a generalizable pathway to making autocalibration efficient via cyberinfrastructure (CI) solutions. SWATShare is a collaborative platform for sharing and visualization of SWAT models, model results, and metadata online. This paper describes the front and back end architectures of SWATShare for enabling efficient SWAT model autocalibration on the web. In addition, this paper also demonstrates three implementation case studies to validate the autocalibration workflow and results. Results from these implementations show that SWATShare autocalibration can produce streamflow hydrograph and parameters that are comparable with commonly used offline SWATCUP calibration outputs. In some instances, the parameter values from SWATShare calibration are more physically relevant than those from SWATCUP. Although the discussion in this paper is in the context of SWAT and SWATShare, the conceptual and technical design presented here can be used as an Open Science blueprint for similar CI-enabled developments in other hydrologic models, and more importantly, in other domains of Earth system sciences.

Collaboration Networks and Career Trajectories: What Do Metadata from Data Repositories Tell Us?

Science is increasingly carried out through scientific collaborations, allowing researchers pool their experience, knowledge, and skills. In this work we identify factors related to a scientist's collaboration capacity, their ability accumulate new collaborations over their career. To do this offer a new collaboration capacity framework and begin the work of validating it empirically by testing a number of hypotheses. We use data from GenBank, a cyberinfrastructure (CI)-enabled data repository that stores and manages scientific data. The data allow us to construct longitudinal networks, thereby giving us yearly scientific collaboration maps. We find that a scientist's network position at an early stage is related to their capacity to build new collaborations and that researchers who manage an upward trend in productivity tend to have higher collaboration capacity. Our work makes a contribution to science of science studies by offering a collaboration capacity framework and providing partial empirical support for it.

Integration of Wireless Sensor Networks in Environmental Monitoring Cyber Infrastructure

Abstract: Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have great potential to revolutionize many science and engineering domains. We present a novel environmental monitoring system with a focus on overall system architecture for seamless integration of wired and wireless sensors for long-term, remote, and near-real-time monitoring. We also present a unified framework for sensor data collection, management, visualization, dissemination, and exchange, conforming to the new Sensor Web Enablement standard. Some initial field testing results are also presented. The monitoring system is being integrated into the Texas Environmental Observatory infrastructure for long-term operation. As part of the integrated system, a new WSN-based soil moisture monitoring system is developed and deployed to support hydrologic monitoring and modeling research. This work represents a significant contribution to the empirical study of the emerging WSN technology. We address many practical issues in real-world application scenarios that are often neglected in the existing WSN research

An Analysis of Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures in View Of MITRE ATT&CK

Due to the ever-increasing threat posed by cyber-attacks on important cyber infrastructure, companies are focusing on expanding the knowledge base on cyber security. The Universal Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE), that were a selection of vulnerabilities known as the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures that may be discovered in a wide variety of applications and hardware and which are the most commonly exploited, are the most important things to know about security. They are troublesome, though, because many vulnerabilities do not have a mechanism of dealing with them, making it hard for an attacker to take use of them. ATT&CK, a well-known cyber security risk management methodology, provides mitigation solutions for a wide range of destructive tactics, according to the MITRE Corporation. In the National Vulnerability Database (NVD), there is a collection of security defects that have been publicly revealed, which is referred to as Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) (CVE). In this case various figure of CVE listings, however a few of missing crucial data, like as the type of vulnerability. during this article, our techniques for used Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures data interested in weakness classes by employing a naive Bayes classifier to categories the entries. To assess the classification capabilities of the approach, a set of testing data is gathered and analyzed.

THE FINAL FRONTIER OF CYBERSPACE: THE SEABED BEYOND NATIONAL JURISDICTION AND THE PROTECTION OF SUBMARINE CABLES

AbstractCyberspace is now acknowledged not only as the newest domain of warfare, but also as a space vital to economic, educational and cultural development for all States. This thin consensus ignores the fundamental fact that the backbone of cyber infrastructure—submarine telecommunication cables—is not (for the large part) located within sovereign territorial jurisdiction. The radically increased reliance of States upon submarine data cables emphasises their vulnerability to damage by malicious acts, accidents, or natural phenomena. Faced with these problems, legal analysis has tended to identify gaps or deficiencies in the law, and propose the creation of new legal instruments. The contribution of this article is twofold. First, it expands the frame of analysis to include deliberate damage to cables not only in peacetime but under the law of armed conflict. Second, rather than treating the legal framework as inherently deficient, it considers the extent to which existing rules and principles can be progressively developed, interpreted, or creatively applied to close perceived gaps. This article surveys the existing law specific to the protection of submarine cables and assesses how general principles of the law of the sea, State responsibility, the law on the use of force, and the law of armed conflict apply to this problem. It thus considers in turn the applicable ‘law of peace’, the jus ad bellum and the jus in bello.

Application of Geospatial Data in Cyber security

Geospatial data is often perceived as only being related to maps, compasses and locations. However, the application areas of geospatial data are far wider and even extend to the field of cybersecurity. Not only is there an ability to show points of interest and emerging network traffic conditions, geospatial data also has the ability to model cyber crime growth patterns and indicate affected areas as well as the emergence of certain type of cyber threats.
 Geospatial data can feed into intelligence systems, help with analysis, information sharing, and help create situational awareness. This is particularly useful in the area of cyber security. Geospatial data is very powerful and can help to prioritise cyber threats and identify critical areas of concern.
 Previously, geospatial data was primarily used by militaries, intelligence agencies, weather services or traffic control. Currently, the application of geospatial data has multiplied, and it spans many more industries and sectors. So too for cyber security, geospatial data has a wide number of uses. It may be difficult to find patterns or trends in large data sets. However, the graphic capabilities of geo mapping help present data in more digestible manner. This may help analysts identify emerging issues, threats and target areas. In this paper, the usefulness of geospatial data for cyber security is explored. The paper will cover a framework of the key application areas that geospatial data can serve in the field of cyber security. The ten application areas covered in the paper are: tracking, data analysis, visualisation, situational awareness, cyber intelligence, collaboration, improved response to cyber threats, decision-making, cyber threat prioritisation and protect cyber infrastructure It is aimed that through the paper, the application areas of geospatial data can be more widely adopted.

Impact of cyber attacks on distributed compressive sensing based state estimation in power distribution grids

Modern power distribution grids suffer from multiple vulnerabilities due to the tight integration between the physical system and the cyber infrastructure. Sophisticated and malicious cyber attacks continue to adversely impact the grid operation leading to performance degradation, service interruption, and grid failure. State estimation plays an essential role in grid monitoring and advancing cyber-attack situational awareness. In this regard, this paper first proposes a distributed compressive sensing (CS) state estimation approach for an unobservable distribution grid. The proposed distributed CS approach divides the distribution grid into sub-areas to perform local state estimation. Then an alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) based iterative information exchange among neighboring areas is employed to complete the estimation process. In this estimation process, the impact of loss of measurement data, false data injection (FDI), replay, and neighborhood cyber-attacks is analyzed. Extensive simulations are performed on the IEEE 37-bus and IEEE 123-bus standard networks to demonstrate the algorithm’s robustness to the aforementioned cyber-attacks. A quantitative analysis of computational complexity and simulation time of the distributed CS based approach is also presented.

Performance Health Index for Complex Cyber Infrastructures

Most IT systems depend on a set of configuration variables (CVs) , expressed as a name/value pair that collectively defines the resource allocation for the system. While the ill effects of misconfiguration or improper resource allocation are well-known, there are no effective a priori metrics to quantify the impact of the configuration on the desired system attributes such as performance, availability, etc. In this paper, we propose a Configuration Health Index (CHI) framework specifically attuned to the performance attribute to capture the influence of CVs on the performance aspects of the system. We show how CHI , which is defined as a configuration scoring system, can take advantage of the domain knowledge and the available (but rather limited) performance data to produce important insights into the configuration settings. We compare the CHI with both well-advertised segmented non-linear models and state-of-the-art data-driven models, and show that the CHI not only consistently provides better results but also avoids the dangers of a pure data drive approach which may predict incorrect behavior or eliminate some essential configuration variables from consideration.

Теоретико-ігрові та оптимізаційні моделі і методи підвищення безпеки кіберінфраструктур

Критична інфраструктура взаємозалежних сучасних секторів все більше покладається на кіберсистеми та кіберінфраструктури, які характеризуються зростанням ризиків їх кіберкомпонентів, у тому числі кіберфізичних підсистем. Тому кібербезпека є важливою для захисту критичної інфраструктури. Пошук економічно ефективних шляхів підвищення або підвищення безпеки кіберінфраструктури базується на оптимізаційних моделях і методах стабільності, безпеки та надійності кіберінфраструктури. Ці моделі та методи мають різні сфери застосування та різні напрямки, не обов’язково орієнтовані на стійкість кіберінфраструктури. Зростання ролі інформаційно-комунікаційних технологій вплинуло на концепцію безпеки та характер війни. Багато критичних інфраструктур (аеропорти, лікарні, нафтопроводи) стали потенційно вразливими для організованих кібератак. Сьогодні здійснення головної державної функції оборони і безпеки значною мірою залежить від успішного застосування інформаційно-комунікаційних технологій як сучасних конкурентоспроможних (кінцевих і проміжних) продуктів подвійного призначення, які використовують різні особи з різними цілями. Теорію ігор усе більше застосовують для оцінювання стратегічних взаємодій між нападниками й оборонцями у кіберпросторі. Для дослідження безпеки кіберпростору поєднуються підходи теорії ігор і моделювання. У кіберпросторі арсенал зброї будується шляхом знаходження більшої кількості уразливіших місць у захисті цілі. Вразливість — це слабкість у процедурах безпеки системи, проєкті системи чи його реалізації, а також в організації внутрішнього контролю, якими може скористатися джерело загрози. Динамічний характер вразливостей означає, що вони постійно змінюються з часом. Виявлення вразливості оборонцем знижує ефективність кіберзброї нападника, яка користується даною вразливістю, і підвищує захист цілі. Теорія ігор застосовувалася для вирішення багатьох проблем, включаючи розподіл ресурсів, безпеку мережі, кооперацію осіб. У кіберпросторі часто зустрічається гра розміщення, де нападник і оборонець приймають рішення, куди розподіляти свої відповідні ресурси. Ресурсами оборонця можуть бути інфраструктура безпеки (брандмауери), фінанси, підготовка кадрів. Наприклад, адміністратор мережі може шукати таке розміщення ресурсів, яке мінімізує ризики кібератак (нападів) і водночас витрати захисту від кібератак. Нападник має обмежені ресурси і зазнає ризику бути відстеженим і покараним. Проблему розподілу ресурсів у кіберпросторі можна сформулювати як теоретико-ігрову задачу з урахуванням поняття загального знання і проблеми невизначеної спостережуваності.

Internet of Things (IoT) Security: Status, Challenges and Countermeasures

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a vast concept spreading rapidly throughout the world today. Due to their inherent nature, IoT devices are more vulnerable to attacks than other cyber infrastructure. In a typical IoT system, four different types of layers can be identified. Those layers can be specified as the application layer, data processing (software) layer, network layer, and sensing (physical) layer. According to this architecture, each layer operates under different technologies. Thus, various challenges and vulnerabilities related to security have emerged and exist. Thereby extant and forthcoming IoT applications must comply with standard cyber security guides and regulations to guarantee safety; otherwise, they would jeopardize the lives of people using these IoT applications resulting in chaos. To achieve this, IoT applications can create environments with end-to-end security by adding security measures and the required adjustment, guaranteeing safety and privacy. By bearing this in mind, this research reviews the different types of security challenges, such as access control attacks and physical security attacks found in each of the four layers of the IoT architecture, along with what countermeasures can be taken to mitigate these attacks. As the main objective of this research is to examine underlying security challenges in the standard IoT architecture, we examine and categorize IoT vulnerabilities and outline methods used to ensure such IoT systems safety. Further, we also present the future directions in terms of security and privacy of IoT as well.

A Formal Model and Verification for HESTIA: An Automated, Adversary-Aware Risk Assessment Process for Cyber Infrastructure

Due to the characteristics and connectivity of today’s critical infrastructure systems, cyber-attacks on these systems are currently difficult to prevent in an efficient and sustainable manner. Prevention and mitigation strategies need accurate identification and evaluation of: system vulnerabilities, potential threats and attacks, and applicable hardening measures. Furthermore, the ability to prioritize hardening measures based on accurate assessments of risk is needed. In addition, the consideration of the availability, applicability, and cost of potential mitigation strategies is also needed. To address this challenge we created HESTIA: High-level and Extensible System for Training and Infrastructure risk Assessment. In this article we present a formal model of the HESTIA system. We then also present a formal verification of the HESTIA semantic model.

Sajber napadi sa aspekta međunarodnog i unutrašnjeg prava

There is no doubt that international as well as internal legal regulation of the use of cyber space will be one of the most important topics in the near future. Namely, the development of information technologies, as well as the solutions that these technologies offer, which are used in cyberspace, will significantly improve the quality of international life structures and thus the individual structure in the future As a proposal for comparison, we cite an example of the formation of joint investigative teams, due to the fact that very often the perpetrators are from several countries and act in co-perpetration. By forming such criminal-legal teams from several countries, the goal of identifying the perpetrators, obtaining the necessary evidence and prosecuting the perpetrators of criminal acts can be achieved. As we have already emphasized, the very speed of development of modern technology, as well as the possibility of its misuse, imposes the need for every state to develop a system of defense of institutions and citizens against this type of threats. High-tech crime knows no borders, and the target can be any country, institution or individual, which leads to the conclusion that in addition to the internal regulation of this area, international cooperation is also necessary in order to adequately oppose this type of crime. Also, the calming of tensions between the most developed countries in the world, which must happen at some point, will increase the interest in solving international legal restrictions on the use of cyberspace with the aim of increasing national security in cyberspace and creating conditions for the economic development of countries and the formation of world and regional markets. In the end, it can be concluded that the normative - legal international regulation of the use of cyberspace and the prevention of misuse of modern information and communication technologies is a prerequisite for the further progress of humanity. In the future, all this will lead to close cooperation of all internationally relevant factors in the development of common standards and rules, the definition of common response mechanisms to cyber attacks and the formation of a common security cyber infrastructure with the aim of preventing cyber attacks and increasing cyber security on a global level.

Cyber Physical Systems Security for Maritime Assets

The integration of IT, OT, and human factor elements in maritime assets is critical for their efficient and safe operation and performance. This integration defines cyber physical systems and involves a number of IT and OT components, systems, and functions that involve multiple and diverse communication paths that are technologically and operationally evolving along with credible cyber security threats. These cyber security threats and risks as well as a number of known security breach scenarios are described in this paper to highlight the evolution of cyber physical systems in the maritime domain and their emerging cyber vulnerabilities. Current industry and governmental standards and directives related to cyber security in the maritime domain attempt to enforce the regulatory compliance and reinforce asset cyber security integrity for optimum and safe performance with limited focus, however, in the existing OT infrastructure and systems. The use of outside-of-the-maritime industry security risk assessment tools and processes, such the API STD 780 Security Risk Assessment (SRA) and the Bow Tie Analysis methodologies, can assist the asset owner to assess its IT and OT infrastructure for cyber and physical security vulnerabilities and allocate proper mitigation measures assuming their similarities to ICS infrastructure. The application of cyber security controls deriving from the adaptation of the NIST CSF and the MITRE ATT&CK Threat Model can further increase the cyber security integrity of maritime assets, assuming they are periodically evaluated for their effectiveness and applicability. Finally, the improvement in communication among stakeholders, the increase in operational and technical cyber and physical security resiliency, and the increase in operational cyber security awareness would be further increased for maritime assets by the convergence of the distinct physical and cyber security functions as well as onshore- and offshore-based cyber infrastructure of maritime companies and asset owners.

Smart City a Vision of India to Provide People with Better Lifestyle and Move towards a Sustainable Development

Abstract: Urban transformation is very important with rapid migration taking place from rural to urban sector. Smart city mission which was launched in 2015 , is a revolutionary approach to reform and rebuild old cities and develop 100 satellites based cities which will provide maximum benefit to people at a minimum cost with better infrastructure and services , smart agriculture and smart health care system , the smart cities are environmentally friendly and runs on technology , provide housing for all , it will also help to end poverty and alleviate the issue of urban slums . Smart cities is an area based approach for which India also needs to upgrade its cyber infrastructure and provide digital education to its citizens , a collaborative approach by the state and central government will make India’s smart city success . Decent cities which have no space left for accommodation is also rebuilding itself to make the standard of living better for people with sustainable development , promoting green economy , green energy and green funds . Keywords: Urban transformation, Smart cities, green economy, technology, rebuild, revolutionary approach

Security framework for smart cyber infrastructure

Security framework for smart cyber infrastructure

Cyber-resilience of Critical Cyber Infrastructures: Integrating digital twins in the electric power ecosystem

This contribution presents a model for cyber-resilience of critical cyber infrastructures (CCI) based on the implementation of a digital twin. It addresses the risks associated with the integration of computational, communication and physical aspects of CCIs. We focus specifically on cybersecurity in the electric power sector due both to its salience and to the potential risks associated to failures in guaranteeing resilience. Informed by the literature on information security management, situational awareness (SA) and common operational picture (COP), we derive an overarching model to provide CCIs’ actors with increased cyber situational awareness, common understanding of incidents and enhanced response capacity. On the practical side, the model seeks to minimize response time and to reduce the impact of cyber-attacks on the organizations and on society as a whole. We develop a process model and validate three design propositions through a formative evaluation in the context of a digital twin implementation in the EU electrical power sector. We discuss the implications of this model for further research as well as practical applications for the electrical power sector.

Cyber Infrastructure as a Service to Empower Multidisciplinary, Data-Driven Scientific Research

Cyber Infrastructure as a Service to Empower Multidisciplinary, Data-Driven Scientific Research

Replacing the SpCas9 HNH domain by deaminases generates compact base editors with an alternative targeting scope

Base editors are RNA-guided deaminases that enable site-specific nucleotide transitions. The targeting scope of these Cas-deaminase fusion proteins critically depends on the availability of a protospacer adjacent motif (PAM) at the target locus and is limited to a window within the CRISPR-Cas R-loop, where single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) is accessible to the deaminase. Here, we reason that the Cas9-HNH nuclease domain sterically constrains ssDNA accessibility and demonstrate that omission of this domain expands the editing window. By exchanging the HNH nuclease domain with a monomeric or heterodimeric adenosine deaminase, we furthermore engineer adenine base editor variants (HNHx-ABEs) with PAM-proximally shifted editing windows. This work expands the targeting scope of base editors and provides base editor variants that are substantially smaller. It moreover informs of potential future directions in Cas9 protein engineering, where the HNH domain could be replaced by other enzymes that act on ssDNA.