Identity Protection Research Articles

Scrutinizing the Vulnerability of Ephemeral Diffie–Hellman over COSE (EDHOC) for IoT Environment Using Formal Approaches

Most existing conventional security mechanisms are insufficient, mainly attributable to their requirements for heavy processing capacity, large protocol message size, and longer round trips, for resource-intensive devices operating in an Internet of Things (IoT) context. These devices necessitate efficient communication and security protocols that are cognizant of the severe resource restrictions regarding energy, computation, communication, and storage. To realize this, the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force) is currently working towards standardizing an ephemeral key-based lightweight and authenticated key exchange protocol called EDHOC (Ephemeral Diffie–Hellman over COSE). The protocol’s primary purpose is to build an OSCORE (Object Security for Constrained RESTful Environments) security environment by supplying crucial security properties such as secure key exchange, mutual authentication, perfect forward secrecy, and identity protection. EDHOC will most likely dominate IoT security once it becomes a standard. It is, therefore, imperative to inspect the protocol for any security flaw. In this regard, two previous studies have shown different security vulnerabilities of the protocol using formal security verification methods. Yet, both missed the vital security flaws we found in this paper: resource exhaustion and privacy attacks. In finding these vulnerabilities, we leveraged BAN-Logic and AVISPA to formally verify both EDHOC protocol variants. Consequently, we described these security flaws together with the results of the related studies and put forward recommended solutions as part of our future work.

Developing a Viable Cultural Heritage Tourism Site at the Tombs of the Masingo at Swongozwi: Lessons Drawn from the Muzibu-Azaala-Mpanga, Kasubi, Uganda

The Northern Limpopo Province of South Africa is characterized by a number of natural, environmental and cultural heritage sites, which could be developed into sustainable tourism sites. These sites could assist formerly disadvantaged communities improve on their livelihood options. This study covers the cultural heritage site of the tombs of the Masingo dynasty of the Vhavenda. The site is located in the Vhembe District of Limpopo Province, South Africa. The study used the model applied at the Baganda cultural heritage site at the Kasubi tombs in Uganda, where some Baganda kings (kabakas) are buried in what is known as the Muzibu-Azaala Mpanga. Historical critical analysis was applied to data collected through a qualitative literature study, key informant interviews, and site visits. The study found that, while Ugandans supported Kasubi being used for tourism purposes, the custodians of the Swongozwi site were not willing to make the site available for tourism development, or any other economic activities. Developing cultural heritage sites of indigenous African peoples should be informed by their attitudes to the protection of culture and identity, though it means that opportunities for poverty alleviation are missed. The result corroborated other studies conducted earlier amongst the Vhavenda.

Anonymous and secret communication in quantum networks

Secure communication is one of the key applications of quantum networks. In recent years, following the demands for identity protection in classical communication protocols, the need for anonymity has also emerged for quantum networks. Here, we demonstrate that quantum physics allows parties—besides communicating securely over a network—to also keep their identities secret. We implement such an anonymous quantum conference key agreement by sharing multipartite entangled states in a quantum network. We demonstrate the protocol with four parties and establish keys in subsets of the network—different combinations of two and three parties—whilst keeping the participating parties anonymous. We additionally show that the protocol is verifiable and run multiple key generation and verification routines. Our work thus addresses one of the key challenges of networked communication: keeping the identities of the communicating parties private.

ADT

Data anonymization is commonly utilized for the protection of an individual's identity when his personal or sensitive data is published. A well-known anonymization model to define the privacy of transactional data is the km-anonymity model. This model ensures that an adversary who knows up to m items of an individual cannot determine which record in the dataset corresponds to the individual with a probability greater than 1/k. However, the existing techniques generally rely on the presence of similarity between items in the dataset tuples to achieve km-anonymization and are not suitable when transactional data contains tuples without many common values. The authors refer to this type of transactional data as diverse transactional data and propose an algorithm, anonymization of diverse transactional data (ADT). ADT is based on slicing and generalization to achieve km-anonymity for diverse transactional data. ADT has been experimentally evaluated on two datasets, and it has been found that ADT yields higher privacy protection and causes a lower loss in data utility as compared to existing methods.

A Settlement Experience on Protection of Physical Identity and Image Enhancement: The Example of Osmaneli (Bilecik)

YYoğun kentleşme hareketleri, aşırı tüketim, enerji kaynaklarının bilinçsiz kullanımı, çeşitli sebeplerle insanların büyük kentlere göç etmesi ve hızlı nüfus artışı günümüz kentlerinin ortak sorunlarıdır. Kentlerle ilgili sorunların farkına varan bazı yerel yönetimler 1999 yılında İtalya’da Yavaş Kent Hareketi (Cittaslow Movement) adında bir kentsel hareket başlatmışlardır. Yavaş Kent Hareketi’nin temel hedefi, mekanların gelişimini iyi yemek, sağlıklı çevreler, sürdürülebilir ekonomi ve toplumsal yaşamın geleneksel ritüelleri esas alınarak beslemektir. Yavaş Kent olmaya aday kentler; yerel sanat ve zanaatleri teşvik etmenin yanı sıra ürünleri bölgeyi tanımlı kılan, bölgeye kimlik ve imaj kazandıran modern endüstrinin desteklenmesini de sağlamak üzere faaliyet gösterirler. Ayrıca, yapılı çevrenin karakterinin korunması, ağaç dikimi; yeşil alanların, bisiklet yollarının ve yayalaştırılmış bölgelerin arttırılması, meydanların reklam panoları ve neonlardan arındırılmış olması, araba alarmlarının yasaklanması, gürültü kirliliğinin, ışık kirliliğinin ve hava kirliliğinin azaltılması, alternatif enerji kullanımının desteklenmesi, toplu taşımanın ve yeni düzenlemeler içinde ekoloji dostu mimarinin geliştirilmesi de Yavaş Kent’lerin zorunlu uygulamalarından bazılarıdır.Bilecik ili Ankara, İstanbul, Eskişehir, Bursa gibi büyük kentlere yakın olmasıyla coğrafi olarak, çeşitli uygarlıklara ev sahipliği yapması ve Osmanlı Devleti’nin kuruluşunda merkez görevi görmesi ve Kurtuluş Savaşı’nda verdiği mücadelelerle tarihi olarak önemli bir konumdadır. Çalışma ile Osmaneli kentinin Yavaş Kent Hareketi’ne katılmaya uygunluk durumunun incelenmesi, Yavaş Kent Hareketi’ne katılmanın Osmaneli kent imajını geliştirmeye yönelik yapacağı olumlu fiziksel etkilerin saptanması ve tasarıma yönelik önerilerin geliştirilmesi hedeflenmiştir.

Penal nationalism in the settler colony: On the construction and maintenance of ‘national whiteness’ in settler Canada

The summer of 2020 was one of unprecedented mass protest and a growing critical awareness around the racist operation of criminal justice systems in North America. Consequently, criminal justice systems have been placed squarely at the forefront of struggles for racial equality and social change. While activists, critical researchers, and legal experts have argued racial justice requires a diversion of communities and resources away from criminal justice systems, the focus in mainstream policy, media, and academic circles has been on reform. In Canada, a focus on reformist responses to this racial violence has been justified through a distorted view of Canada’s criminal justice system. Drawing on the concept of penal nationalism, I argue that Canadian carceral practices must be understood as constitutive of the settler-colonial state and its ideological, material and institutional mooring in racial whiteness as the locus of settler power and sovereignty. To this end, it is not enough to reform specific penal practices, while leaving intact the legitimacy of the criminal justice system in general. What is at stake is the very definition and protection of a national identity, which in the settler colony is predicated on colonial whiteness, Indigenous erasure, and racialized exploitation.

Identity Protection during the use of Internet

In today’s era, security become important concern. As we are moving towards the digitalization data protection is important issue. To make the data as well system safer we must follow some simple but important steps. These steps works just as safe guard. The concern regarding use of internet become more when we are making digital payment or sharing some useful information. More awareness is also required in case of non-technical person whenever use the internet. In this era technology is reachable to every person. We also execute many financial activities through our mobile / Computer. So many observers are there who are regularly keeping any eye on our activities and never miss our single loophole. Some simple Dos and Don’ts can make the difference and create awareness in the society.

Human identification driven by deep CNN and transfer learning based on multiview feature representations of ECG

Increasingly smart techniques for counterfeiting face and fingerprint traits have increased the potential threats to information security systems, creating a substantial demand for improved security and better privacy and identity protection. The internet of Things (IoT)-driven fingertip electrocardiogram (ECG) acquisition provides broad application prospects for ECG-based identity systems. This study focused on three major impediments to fingertip ECG: the impact of variations in acquisition status, the high computational complexity of traditional convolutional neural network (CNN) models and the feasibility of model migration, and a lack of sufficient fingertip samples. Our main contribution is a novel fingertip ECG identification system that integrates transfer learning and a deep CNN. The proposed system does not require manual feature extraction or suffer from complex model calculations, which improves its speed, and it is effective even when only a small set of training data exists. Using 1200 ECG recordings from 600 individuals, we consider 5 simulated yet potentially practical scenarios. When analyzing the overall training accuracy of the model, its mean accuracy for the 540 chest-collected ECG from PhysioNet exceeded 97.60 %, and for 60 subjects from the CYBHi fingertip-collected ECG, its mean accuracy reached 98.77 %. When simulating a real-world human recognition system on 5 public datasets, the validation accuracy of the proposed model can nearly reach 100 % recognition, outperforming the original GoogLeNet network by a maximum of 3.33 %. To some degree, the developed architecture provides a reference for practical applications of fingertip-collected ECG-based biometric systems and for information network security.

Правообразование в сфере обеспечения миграционной безопасности

The article deals with the problems of the formation of legal regulation in the field of ensuring migration security, in particular, substantiates the need for the normative consolidation of the concept of “migration security” , as well as analyzes the legal regulation of the protection of national identity in Russia in the context of the intensification of migration flows.

Research on Anonymous credential based medical blockchain

For the current medical block chain, the access rights of electronic medical records and agent encryption are mainly controlled by permission contract. The way of protecting electronic medical records realizes the sharing of medical data, but neglects the management and protection of user identity. In this paper, this article studies the privacy protection technology of the blockchain, combined with the stealth address and zero-knowledge proof technology, and proposes a plan to weigh anonymity and security to protect the privacy of users in the medical blockchain.

State legal mechanism for ensuring environmental and technogenic safety

In the light of the ongoing state administration reform, it is relevant to examine the state legal mechanism for ensuring environmental and technogenic security as the types of national security. The subject of this research is the definition of the concept and structure of such mechanism, which is an essential condition for ensuring the protection of favorable environment; observance of the interests of citizens and legal entities, society and the state; prevention of threats of natural and technogenic emergency situations; and minimization of the consequences of such situations. On the institutional level, the state legal mechanism for ensuring environmental safety represents the system of governing institutions assigned with the implementation of the key directions and mechanisms for ensuring environmental and technogenic safety; as well as private and legal entities, whose legal status includes the rights and responsibilities in the sphere of ensuring environmental and technogenic safety. On the technological level, the state legal mechanism is characterized by the types of legal activity. On the instrumental level, it represent a set of means and methods at the disposal of the entities. The scientific novelty of this research lies in examination of the essential aspects of the state legal mechanism for ensuring certain types of national security, as well as in formulation of the concept of the state legal mechanism applicable to ensuring environmental and technogenic safety, the absence of which impedes the assessment of the effectiveness of such mechanism in relation to protection of identity, society, and the state from environmental and technogenic hazards, threats and conflicts. The conclusion is made that a range of problems arises in the context of formation of the state legal mechanism for ensuring environmental safety: the existing model of state regulation of greenhouse gas emissions, which is based on voluntary inventory, obstructs the acquisition of information on the volume of greenhouse gas emissions by the administrative authorities; the created information systems in the sphere of environmental security are not an effective mechanism for achieving the goals of the Strategy of Environmental Security; there is certain inconsistency in environmental surveillance regulation.

Country name designation and international IP protection of national competitive identities

Country name designation and international IP protection of national competitive identities

Group-based Tai Chi as therapy for alleviating experiences of social death in people with advanced, incurable disease: an ethnographic study

ABSTRACT Advanced, incurable disease is a highly stressful and traumatic life event that can lead to losses of social identity, social connectedness, and losses associated with bodily disintegration. The combination of these losses makes it difficult to remain socially active and sometimes results in experiences of social death. However, few studies have explored the role of group-based hospice activities for mitigating the impact of social death in people with advanced, incurable disease. The aim of this study was to explore the personal and social experiences of participating in hospice-based Tai Chi among people with advanced, incurable disease, including its impact in mitigating experiences of social death. A focused ethnography was used to guide this study. Six months were spent in a local hospice day therapy unit in England collecting data through multiple methods, including 17 semi-structured interviews, 200 hours of participant observation, and informal conversations with 19 participants (15 females; 4 males, aged between 50 and 91). Data were analysed using a thematic framework approach and represented using traditional tales and ethnographic creative non-fictions (CNF). Two main themes were developed: (1) fostering social connections and meaningful support; and (2) the protection of a collective identity. An ethnographic CNF ‘moving and being together’ presents these themes in evocative, engaging, and accessible ways. Study findings demonstrate the value of group-based Tai Chi for mitigating experiences of social death in people with advanced, incurable disease. Ethnographic CNFs are a valuable way to represent lived experiences of illness in palliative and hospice care populations.

őslakos népek kulturális identitáshoz való joga az Emberi Jogok Amerikaközi Bírósága joggyakorlatában

Jelen tanulmány a kulturális identitás védelmét vizsgálja az Emberi Jogok Amerikaközi Bíróságának (EJAB) gyakorlatában, ahol a kérdéskör elsősorban az őslakos népek kontextusában jelenik meg. Az EJAB a kulturális identitáshoz való jog védelmét – az ezt garantáló, anyagi jogi norma hiányában – jellemzően az élethez és a tulajdonhoz való jogból, valamint egyéb, első generációs emberi jogokból vezeti le evolutív módon, az Emberi Jogok Amerikai Egyezményére (EJAE) támaszkodva. 2020 tavaszán a Lhaka Honhat kontra Argentína ügyben hozott ítéletében az EJAB új perspektívát nyitott a kulturális identitáshoz való jog védelmére, mert megállapította, hogy a kulturális jogok önállóan, autonóm módon is érvényesíthetők az EJAB előtt, az EJAE 26. cikke alapján. Ez, az EJAB eddigi joggyakorlatához képest haladó szemlélet egyúttal új lehetőségeket nyit meg az EJAE 26. cikkéből eredeztethető környezetvédelmi jogok érvényesíthetősége terén is.

Biometrijski standardi i metode

Introduction/purpose: Nowadays, user identification systems play a very important role in modern society. Complex security requirements have led experts to explore ways in which biometric data can be used to identify user identities. This paper presents an overview of biometric standards and methods which can be used to identify users in biometric systems, and therefore to protect information and communication systems. Methods: This paper deals with the problem of standardization in the field of biometrics. The first part of the paper presents concrete examples of the most widely used biometric standards. The second part of the paper gives an overview of the most used biometric methods. Results: The obtained results show that the development of biometric systems and biometric sensors contributes to better protection of identity from misuse, because biometric technologies have great potential for improving the security and accuracy of system operation. Biometric systems improve the security of users and also provide much greater precision in establishing identity. Conclusion: The development of biometric standards should focus on their interconnectivity, as well as on increasing connectivity with other IT standards.

Securitization of Memory: a Theoretical Framework to Study the Latvian Case

The article suggests and argues a theoretical framework for studying a particular case of memory securitization. It is based on the constructivist perception of security that is systematically framed in the studies of representatives of the Copenhagen School, who consider security as a socially constructed phenomenon and define identity protection to be one of its primary goals.
 Pursuant to this approach, the article presents a correlation between memory and security in at least three aspects. In the first instance, similar to security, collective memory is socially determined. In the second instance, collective memory lies at the core of various forms of identity, including national identity. In the third instance, collective memory is not only an object of protection but also a resource, which is used by securitization actors for threat identification, enemy image modeling as well as for defining the means of protection.
 The Latvian case is applied for setting the theoretical framework of the memory securitization model. In future, it might be used to study specific juridical and political mechanisms of memory securitization in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe.
 The authors perceive the securitization of memory as a diverse complex of measures aimed at establishing and setting a certain historical narrative, as well as convincing society to be actively loyal to it. Accordingly, the policy of memory is defined as a mechanism for putting securitization in practice. The initial conditions for understanding this process in Latvia are the post-communist transition, ethnocultural divisions of the society, and the external factor represented by Russia, that promotes its historical narratives.
 In one respect, R. Brubaker’s concept of the “nationalized” state is taken as a theoretical model of the politics of memory in Latvia. According to this concept, the official narrative of post-communist countries has been set as a nation-oriented one. On the other hand, the concept of the memory regime developed by M. Bernhard and J. Kubik is also considered. As per their theory, the memory regime in Latvia can be described as being divided into the official and alternative narrative of counter-memory, which is based on the Soviet legacy.

Exploring the challenges in protecting the identity of small historic towns in Malaysia

Purpose Built heritage constitutes the uniqueness and identity of a place. While being overlooked in existing research, built heritage in small towns is increasingly threatened by dilapidation, exhaustion and disappearance. Therefore, this study aims to examine the challenges in protecting the unique features and identity of small towns with regard to building regulations, guidelines and policies. Design/methodology/approach A semi-structured interview was conducted amongst a purposive sample of nine stakeholders from different organizations involved in heritage matters in Malaysia to investigate the issues and challenges facing the protection of small towns’ identity with regard to existing protection mechanisms impacting development of the towns. The data were then analyzed using the qualitative software package NVivo 8.0. The summary models imported from NVivo were created to visualize the connections between various dimensions of constructs, concepts and categories identified in the interviews. Findings The study found that the current issues of built heritage protection at the local level can be classified into five emergent themes: legislative, institutional, economic, social and technical issues. While absence of specific guideline for identifying local cultural places has been identified as the most fundamental issues facing the protection of unique and distinct resources in small Malaysia towns, the paper concludes with a framework of measures that can then be used for identification and protection of small town identity. Originality/value This study is the first of many fruitful contributions that examine heritage identification and protection mechanisms at the local level.

The Language of Derogation and Hate: Functions, Consequences, and Reappropriation

Over the last decades, the use of explicit derogatory language (e.g., hate speech, slurs, micro-insults) has risen in many countries. We provide an overview on blatant language discrimination, including its psychological antecedents and consequences. After presenting a working definition of derogatory language and describing its prevalence, we discuss the social functions it serves and the role it plays in identity protection, in legitimizing group hierarchies, and in establishing and enforcing group norms. Drawing from both the socio-cognitive and discursive traditions in social psychology, it is argued that the language people are exposed to and the language they employ, shape the way they think and construct reality. We also consider two ways in which targeted groups may respond to derogatory language, specifically confrontation and reappropriation. Finally, we address challenges for future research, in particular the need for more cross disciplinary research to ebb the growing proliferation of hate speech on digital media which has become a global international concern.

Efficacy of fungicides against brown spot on walnuts in the Western Forest-Steppe of Ukraine

Goal. To study the effectiveness of fungicides against brown spot of walnut in the Western Forest-Steppe of Ukraine.
 Methods. The studies were carried out during 2018—2019. in agrocenoses of the walnut garden of the Ukrainian Research Station of Plant Quarantine of the Institute of Plant Protection of the NAAS. At the detailed account inspected not less than 3—4 accounting trees from four parties of a crown and analyzed on 25 accounting bodies (leaves, shoots, fruits) and determined intensity of defeat. The study of the effectiveness of fungicides against brown spot was carried out on the nut variety Bukovynsky 2 using drugs: Bordeaux liquid, 1-percent solution — the standard; Kuproksat, s. c., (copper sulphate tribasic, 345 g/l), Medyan Extra 350 SC s. c., (copper chloride, 350 g/l).
 Results. Defeat of leaves at the last account in variants with the drug Medyan Extra 350 SC s. c., decreased in comparison with control in 2.6 times, development of a disease — in 2.8 times. By all indicators, the variant with the drug Kuproksat, hp was more effective, where the brown leaf spot was 20.5% (64.5% in the control), the disease was 9.3% (31.4% in the control). Fetal damage in the last account in the experimental variants was respectively 2.7—3.9 times less, and the development of the disease — 3.1—4.2 times weaker than in the control.
 Conclusions. The obtained data show that in the conditions of the western Forest-Steppe of Ukraine the application of fungicides on walnut both in the experimental and in the reference variants provided good and approximately identical protection of the nut against brown spot Ophiognomonia leptostyla (Fr.) Sogonov. The effectiveness of fungicides was the highest in the variant with the drug Kuproksat, hp, (on the leaves — 70.4%, on the fruits — 75.9%). Technical efficiency of the drug Medyan Extra 350 SC, s. c. on leaves and fruits was 64.6 and 67.9%, respectively. Fungicide treatment of experimental plots helps to reduce the incidence of the disease, which makes it possible to obtain a yield of 0.9—1.1 t/ha higher than in the control.

The Potential of Positive Obligations Against Romaphobic Attitudes and in the Development of ‘Roma Pride’

The article analyses the jurisprudence of international tribunals on the education and housing of Roma and Travellers to understand whether positive obligations can change the hearts and minds of the majority and promote minority identities. Case law on education deals with integration rather than cultural specificities, while in the context of housing it accommodates minority needs. Positive obligations have achieved a higher level of compliance in the latter context by requiring majorities to tolerate the minority way of life in overwhelmingly segregated settings. Conversely, little seems to have changed in education, where legal and institutional reform, as well as a shift in both majority and minority attitudes, would be necessary to dismantle social distance and generate mutual trust. The interlocking factors of accessibility, judicial activism, European politics, expectations of political allegiance and community resources explain jurisprudential developments. The weak justiciability of minority rights, the lack of resources internal to the community and dual identities among the Eastern Roma impede legal claims for culture-specific accommodation in education. Conversely, the protection of minority identity and community ties is of paramount importance in the housing context, subsumed under the right to private and family life.