Localized Attack Research Articles

EMBN-MANET: A method to Eliminating Malicious Beacon Nodes in Ultra-Wideband (UWB) based Mobile Ad-Hoc Network

Recent breakthroughs in microelectromechanical systems, microsystem technologies, and wireless communications have made energy-efficient, inexpensive, off-the-shelf devices that unambiguously carry data without communication overhead practical. UWB radio technology employs minimal energy for short-range, high-bandwidth communications throughout a large section of the radio. Mobile computing organizations now explore mobile ad-hoc networks. Decentralized networks communicate. Peer nodes enable wireless device-to-device communication. Location-based and location-aided routing improve ad hoc routing. Physical or involuntary configuration places mobile nodes during deployment. Large networks need too much manual setup. GPS receivers for each sensor unit would significantly increase network installation costs. It inspired non-GPS and non-physical configuration localization. Most localization systems use beacon nodes. Beacon nodes are unique. Standard security approaches block secure beacon nodes, which might compromise localization. This research investigates beacon node localization issues and attacks. We constructed a statistical model to detect rogue beacon nodes in the ad hoc network and studied how various attacks affect localization. Bogus beacon nodes find mobile nodes. We enabled malicious beacon node communication. Trilateration and Received Signal Strength Indicator found unknown nodes. Trilateration detects compromised beacon nodes. The algorithm finds malicious beacon nodes. Our experiments removed 90% of compromised beacon nodes. Our flexible localization technique allows several algorithms and range methods without time complexity. Location identification affected fake beacon nodes.

Stealthy Local Covert Attacks on Cyber-Physical Systems

In cyber-physical systems (CPS), the networked structure not only enhances the accessibility of data, but also introduces the risk of cyber attacks. The stealthy attacks that are undetected by the monitoring system, are the most dangerous type of cyber attacks. In this article, we introduce a new attack strategy to call attention to the problem of stealthy cyber attacks on CPS. The proposed attack scenario does not require access to all control input signals and sensor output signals, so it needs fewer disruption resources and is called a local covert attack. We show that the local covert attack can be made completely stealthy by applying the decoupling technique or by combining the basic idea of a covert attack and a zero-dynamics attack. Simulation results are provided to demonstrate the stealthiness of the proposed local covert attacks.

Corrosion behavior of 316L additively produced by Directed Energy Deposition-Arc

Among all additive manufacturing processes, Directed Energy Deposition-Arc (DED-Arc) shows significantly shorter production times and is particularly suitable for large-volume components of simple to medium complexity. To exploit the full potential of this process, the microstructural, mechanical and corrosion behavior have to be studied. High stickout distances lead to a large offset, which leads to an instable electric arc and thus defects such as lack of fusion. Since corrosion preferentially occurs at such defects, the main objective of this work is to investigate the influence of the stickout distance on the corrosion behavior and microstructure of stainless steel manufactured by DED-Arc.Within the heterogenous structure of the manufactured samples lack of fusion defects were detected. The quantity of such defects was reduced by applying a shorter stickout distance. The corrosion behavior of the additively manufactured specimens was investigated by means of potentiodynamic polarization measurements. The semi-logarithmic current density potential curves showed a similar course and thus similar corrosion resistance like that of the conventionally forged sample. The polarization curve of the reference material shows numerous current peaks, both in the anodic and cathodic regions. This metastable behavior is induced by the presence of manganese sulfides. On the sample surface a local attack by pitting corrosion was identified.

Dynamics and resiliency of networks with concurrent cascading failure and self-healing.

Local attacks in networked systems can often propagate and trigger cascading failures. Designing effective healing mechanisms to counter cascading failures is critical to enhance system resiliency. This work proposes a self-healing algorithm for networks undergoing load-based cascading failure. To advance understanding of the dynamics of networks with concurrent cascading failure and self-healing, a general discrete-time simulation framework is developed, and the resiliency is evaluated using two metrics, i.e., the system impact and the recovery time. This work further explores the effects of the multiple model parameters on the resiliency metrics. It is found that two parameters (reactivated node load parameter and node healing certainty level) span a phase plane for network dynamics where three regimes exist. To ensure full network recovery, the two parameters need to be moderate. This work lays the foundation for subsequent studies on optimization of model parameters to maximize resiliency, which will have implications to many real-world scenarios.

Metallurgical characterization of a failed A106 Gr-B carbon steel welded condensate pipeline in a petroleum refinery

A condensate pipeline made of carbon steel alloy with grade A106-Gr.B, had a leakage in the form of a pinhole at the girth weld after 16 years of operation. Visual examination, optical and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), coupled with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), chemical analysis, and hardness measurements were performed on the failed pipeline samples. Visual examination of the inner surface of the circumferential weld line showed many types of welding defects, as well as severe localized corrosion pits in the weld zone at the bottom of the pipe surface. The microscopic analysis shows that the localized corrosion attack is the root cause of the pipe failure. XRD patterns of the inner surface of the failed pipe emphasizes a formation of corrosion products of iron oxyhydroxides such as Lepiodocrocite (Fe + 3O(OH)), and Goethite (FeO(OH)). Additionally, the foreign elements of aluminum, and chlorine, detected by the EDS analytical results promote under-deposit corrosion, particularly in regions with stagnant water, i.e., at 6 O'clock pipe position.

Corrosion behavior of high-pressure die-cast secondary AlSi9Cu3(Fe) alloy

This research investigated the corrosion behavior and susceptibility to stress corrosion cracking (SCC) of a high-pressure die-cast secondary AlSi9Cu3(Fe) alloy in 3.5 % NaCl solution. Microstructural observations by scanning electron microscope, coupled to energy dispersion spectroscopy, polarization curve recording, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy tests and slow strain rate tests evidenced the presence of critical surface segregation zones, where strong corrosion attack occurs due to composition differences and peculiar morphology of noble Al2Cu phases. No SCC susceptibility was detected, but very strong localized corrosion attack and abundant hydrogen gas bubbling evolved from noble phase/α-Al matrix interphases, determining positive going potential transients.

What distinguishes binary from multi-class intrusion detection systems: Observations from experiments

Modern world has become prune to technology and security is turning invasive by the day. Thus, capturing personal information or access to remote devices can prove to be horrendous intrusions. This paper focuses on various classification algorithms such as K-nearest neighbor Classifier, Multi Layer Perceptron Classifier, Long Short-Term Memory Classifier and Support Vector Machine Classifiers on the revised KDD cup 99 dataset. Attacks namely DoS (Denial of Service attacks), R2L (Root to Local attacks), U2R (User to Root attack) and Probe (Probing attacks) were monitored. Getting the model ready, we aim to identify the attack types based on the data coming through. The study also showcases Uni-variate, Bi-variate as well as Multivariate analysis on the same. The models were optimized and accuracy was found through measures like F1-score, precision, and recall. Promising results were found.

Correlation of Lack of Fusion Pores with Stress Corrosion Cracking Susceptibility of L-PBF 316L: Effect of Surface Residual Stresses.

Stress corrosion cracking (SCC) of laser powder bed fusion-fabricated 316L was studied under the variation in energy input density to emulate the existence of distinctive types of defects. Various electrochemical polarization measurements were performed in as-received polished and ground states, to elucidate the effect of defect type on corrosion and SCC behaviour in marine solution. The results revealed severe localized corrosion attack and SCC initiation for specimens with a lack of fusion pores (LOF). Moreover, the morphology of SCC was different, highlighting a more dominant effect of selective dissolution of the subgrain matrix for gas porosities and a more pronounced effect of brittle fracture at laser track boundaries for the specimens with LOF pores.

Feasibility Study on Aluminum Under Laser Ablation for Corrosion Resistance in Molten Salt

Molten salt is a prevalent medium in nuclear technology, especially in both reactors and waste separation (pyroprocessing) routines. Thus, the application dealing with the molten salt requires compatible materials that can withstand its aggressive environment. Research studies have shown that the purity of the molten salt environment can influence corrosion rates. Fission products, moisture, and oxide corrosion contents all distribute into the salt’s impurity and how it reacts within the system. The naturally occurring corrosion creates some protection via incomplete passivation layers; however, these same impurities start instability in the film through localized attacks. Laser ablation treatments in other research fields have proven useful in the improvement of corrosion resistance in various materials. Yet, this approach has not been tested in molten salt towards nuclear engineering applications. Thus, this becomes a motivation for our study to determine the feasibility of using the laser ablation technique on aluminum samples, creating an oxide layer and testing them in a eutectic LiCl-KCl salt at 773 K simulating a pyroprocessing environment. Over the course of the corrosion test, data sets were collected to allow electrochemical analysis – 24 hour rounds of open circuit voltage, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), and linear sweep voltammetry (LSV). Detailed results will be presented and discussed.

Corrosion Analysis of Al-Ce-X Cast Alloys in Dilute Boric Acid and 3.5 Wt.% NaCl Solutions

New compositions of Al-Ce-X cast alloys have been developed to offer higher material performances than the conventional Al alloys for nuclear and other industrial applications. To assess the corrosion behavior of these new Al-Ce-X alloys, mass change measurements and electrochemical analysis were conducted using 0.23 wt.% boric acid solution, relevant to the water chemistry for the storage pool of spent nuclear fuels, and a 3.5 wt.% NaCl solution approximating sea water. Pre- and Post-corrosion Al alloy specimens were characterized by electron microscope systems including SEM, TEM and EDS. The initial electrochemical and mass change results suggest that Al-Ce-X alloys are resistant to corrosion in 0.23 wt.% boric acid but can be susceptible to corrosion in 3.5 wt.% NaCl solution. The initial characterization of post-corrosion samples indicated that one Al-Ce-X alloy type experiences uniform corrosion without any preferential or local attacks. Further corrosion analysis and characterization are underway for comprehensive understanding of corrosion phenomenon in these new alloys.

Light Metal Alloys Local Reactivity, from AFM Based Scanning Kelvin Probe Force Microscopy (AFM-SKPFM) to Scanning Electrochemical Nanocapillary (SEN)

Materials surface heterogeneities obviously plays a crucial role in reactivity issues and generate various types of detrimental localized corrosion attacks. In corrosion science, a first question to be addressed is how these various materials microstructure affect oxidation / passivation and localized corrosion initiation mechanisms. A methodology for microscale characterization of initial stage of surface reactions has been developed based on the Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) Scanning Kelvin Probe Force Microscopy (AFM-SKPFM). In very early work, potential mapping with micrometer lateral resolution (lateral detection limit of materials surface heterogeneities is better but the signal has to be deconvoluted) allowed to clearly identify "cathodic" and anodic sites on Al- alloys [1]. Careful potential calibration and surface conditioning with solution exposure generating the formation of an electrochemical double layer allow obtaining local thermodynamic information closely linked to "practical electrochemical potential series" measured in bulk solution conditions. This contribution will start by revisiting some "historical" examples of AFM-SKPFM characterization (a tribute to Jerry Frankel's activities) of aluminum and magnesium alloys [1,2]. These materials surfaces will further be used to show how reaction kinetic information on corrosion processes can be obtained with similar lateral resolution by means of the newly developed Scanning Electrochemical Nanocapillary (SEN) technique. After introducing the SEN technique and methodology, the presentation will focus on showing how the combination of these two approaches allows refining the local corrosion mechanism assessment of heterogeneous materials. The SEN technique is very versatile and allows various types of electrochemical measurements to be performed with constant tracking of the topography. The technique is based on a nanocapillary glass tip (< 100 nm) excited laterally by a piezoelectric element. A control of the capillary vibration damping when approaching the surface and a feedback loop (like the tapping mode in AFM) allows a very precise control of the approach and electrolyte contact on the surface. The glass capillary filled with the electrolyte of interest integrates a reference and Pt counter electrodes to perform electrochemical measurements exposing only the area of interest to aggressive electrolytes. Using its "hopping" mode (a scan with electrochemical characterization of successive individual nanoscale areas), corrosion initiation susceptibility can be addressed. This will be illustrated through the surface reactivity study of model Al-Cu-Mg microscale intermetallics and Mg-based alloys, using SEN OCP linescans. In addition information about extend of the attack can be subsequently retrieved from SEM observations. Using the precise positioning ability of the SEN setup with X, Y and Z direction piezos, potentiodynamic polarization measurements can furthermore be performed on selected area of interest. The example of an Mg-Fe composite material will be used to discuss its local electrochemical behavior.After the presentation of the SEN characterization results, additional aspects of the measured potential by AFM-SKPFM will also be discussed as adsorbed species, especially strong dipolar molecules, can significantly contribute to the measured signal [3]. Modification of the AFM-SKPFM setup towards atmospheric corrosion investigation will finally be presented. This environmental AFM/SKPFM bridges the gap between the full electrochemical local characterizations that can be offered by the SEN technique and an "electrochemical reaction" diagnostic obtained by SKPFM in thin water layer. The example of a very reactive WC-Co composite will be presented to demonstrate the reactivity issue, galvanic coupling controlling local dissolution processes [4].AcknowledgementsGerald Frankel for the great time I spent at Ohio State University in the Fontana Corrosion Center developing the AFM-based SKPFM methodology. Empa for internal project financial support of the SEN instrument.

Mechanism of localized corrosion issues of austenitic steels exposed to flowing lead with 10−7 wt.% oxygen at 480°C up to 16,000 h

As part of research into resistant materials for the construction of lead-cooled fast reactors, specimens of 316L and 15-15Ti stainless steel were exposed to flowing lead with 10−7 wt.% oxygen at 480 °C for 16,000 h. Post-test microscopic analyses revealed a possible mechanism of long-term susceptibility to localized solution-based attack. The corrosion of both austenitic steels was low, a thin oxide layer (80–240 nm) thin was formed, and a large-scale dissolution attack was not observed. The surface was mostly covered by a protective thin spinel film with variable Cr, Fe, and Mn ratios. With increasing exposure time, the proportion of Mn was increased replacing Fe, and the probability of localized deeper failures increased. Maintaining the spinel film depleted the subsurface layer and triggered the precipitation of new phases. The corrosion resistance was enhanced by the presence of a work-hardened surface layer formed by lathe turning. The thin film is sometimes exfoliated and then regenerated without any consequences or allows deep oxidation to start.

Influence of copper and aluminum substitution on high‐temperature oxidation of the FeCoCrNiMn “Cantor” alloy

AbstractIn this study, the oxidation behavior of FeCoCrNiMn (HEA + Mn) is compared to three modified HEAs manufactured by substituting Mn with Al, Cu, or Al + Cu. Oxidation tests were conducted between 600°C and 800°C for up to 500 h in synthetic air. Substitution of Mn leads to a significant improvement in the oxidation resistance for the three modified HEAs. For FeCoCrNiCu (HEA + Cu), a local attack of a Cu‐rich phase was observed, leading to the formation of CuO blisters on the surface. The FeCoCrNiAl (HEA + Al) alloy was characterized by the formation of a thin Al2O3 surface layer for all temperatures. However, for the HEA + Al alloy the formation of AlN was observed after 300 h at 800°C, leading to a partial breakdown of the protective scale. FeCoCrNiCuAl (HEA + Cu + Al) by far showed the best oxidation resistance, characterized by the formation of a highly protective Al2O3 scale that effectively inhibited nitrogen penetration into the metal subsurface and local attack of the Cu‐rich phase.

Target recovery of the economic system based on the target reinforcement path method.

An effective and stable operation of an economic system leads to a prosperous society and sustainable world development. Unfortunately, the system faces inevitable perturbations of extreme events and is frequently damaged. To maintain the system's stability, recovering its damaged functionality is essential and is complementary to strengthening its resilience and forecasting extreme events. This paper proposes a target recovery method based on network and economic equilibrium theories to defend the economic system against perturbations characterized as localized attacks. This novel method stimulates a set of economic sectors that mutually reinforce damaged economic sectors and is intuitively named the target reinforcement path (TRP) method. Developing a nonlinear dynamic model that simulates the economic system's operation after being perturbed by a localized attack and recovering based on a target recovery method, we compute the relaxation time for this process to quantify the method's efficiency. Furthermore, we adopt a rank aggregation method to comprehensively measure the method's efficiency by studying the target recovery of three country-level economic systems (China, India, and Japan) for 73 different regional attack scenarios. Through a comparative analysis of the TRP method and three other classic methods, the TRP method is shown to be more effective and less costly. Applicatively, the proposed method exhibits the potential to recover other vital complex systems with spontaneous recovery ability, such as immune, neurological, and ecological systems.

Security and Privacy in Artificial Intelligence-Enabled 6G

The sixth-generation (6G) mobile communication network is expected to provide world-connected smart and autonomous services by leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. In particular, federated learning (FL) is advocated to promote the implementations of ubiquitous AI applications in 6G, where massive distributed data is utilized to cooperatively train AI models as well as protect privacy and reduce resource consumption. However, due to the large number of interactions among mobile devices or infrastructures in FL, the AI inevitably suffers from a series of potential privacy and security risks. In this article, we investigate the security and privacy of AI-enabled 6G. Specifically, we first present the AI-enabled 6G architecture, including the space-air-ground-ocean integrated network (SAGOIN) architecture and two different FL-based AI model training frameworks in 6G. Furthermore, we discuss in detail the privacy and security threats, including cheating attack, low-quality local model training attack, and privacy stealing attack. Afterwards, we present a case study to design the security and privacy preservation scheme by integrating the trust evaluation, Q-learning based incentive, and local differential privacy (LDP) mechanism. Finally, we give out several future research directions in promising AI-enabled 6G.

Quantifying Location Privacy for Navigation Services in Sustainable Vehicular Networks

Current connected and autonomous vehicles will contribute to various and green vehicular services. However, sharing personal data with untrustworthy Navigation Service Providers (NSPs) raises serious location concerns. To address this issue, many Location Privacy-Preserving Mechanisms (LPPMs) have been proposed. In addition, several quantification methods have been designed to help understand location privacy and illustrate how location privacy is leaked. However, their assessment is insufficient due to the incomplete assumptions about the adversary’s model. In particular, users tend to request the same navigation routes from <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">home</i> to <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">workplace</i> and acquire traffic information along the route. An adversary can collect the coordinates of adjacent locations and infer the two true locations. In this paper, we provide a formal framework for the analysis of LPPMs in navigation services. Our framework captures extra information that is available to an adversary performing localization attacks. By formalizing the adversary’s performance, we also propose and justify two new metrics to quantify location privacy in navigation services, namely <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">accuracy</i> and <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">visibility</i> . We assess the efficacy of two popular LPPMs for location privacy, i.e., differential privacy and <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${k}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> -anonymity. Experimental results demonstrate that the adversary can recover users’ locations with a high probability.

Cascading traffic jamming in a two-dimensional Motter and Lai model.

We study the cascading traffic jamming on a two-dimensional random geometric graph using the Motter and Lai model. The traffic jam is caused by a localized attack incapacitating a circular region or a line of a certain size, as well as a dispersed attack on an equal number of randomly selected nodes. We investigate if there is a critical size of the attack above which the network becomes completely jammed due to cascading jamming, and how this critical size depends on the average degree 〈k〉 of the graph, on the number of nodes N in the system, and the tolerance parameter α of the Motter and Lai model.

Electrochemical Evolution of Carbon Steel and Fe-9% Cr Steel Rebar in Simulated Concrete Pore Solution (SCPS) in the Presence of 3.5 wt% NaCl

Carbon steel rebar (ASTM A615) has been widely used in reinforced concrete (RC), but its susceptibility to chloride ions remains a critical issue. Low alloy chromium steel has been used to increase corrosion resistance and extend service life, such as in 9% Cr rebar (ASTM A1035-CS). In this work, we characterized two electrochemical systems over time: ASTM A615 and A1035-CS corrugated rebar immersed in SCPS in the presence of NaCl for 12 months. The interfacial processes evolution for the ASTM A1035-CS rebar for both general and local corrosion showed different active-passive responses from those of carbon steel. Because the 3.5% wt. NaCl exceeded the chloride threshold for passive breakdown of both materials, the ASTM A1035-CS showed a five-fold higher impedance and lower general corrosion rate. In localized conditions, the low alloy chrome content rebar showed less density localized attack than the ASTM A615 rebar. These results were attributed to the overall damage evolution involving the formation and stability of corrosion products over time. The local attack appeared to be a random spatial process due to changes in the local environment.

The Initial Corrosion Behavior of AZ31B Magnesium Alloy in Chloride and Sulfate Solutions

The initial corrosion of Mg alloys is important for the conversion coating treatment, by which the conversion coating is formed in a few minutes of immersion in the conversion solution. This study detailed the initial corrosion of AZ31B Mg alloy in chloride and sulfate solutions by acquiring the open circuit potential, optical image and hydrogen evolution, together with the post-immersion TEM and XPS characterization. Before the breakdown of the surface film, more hydrogen evolved in the SO4 2− solution than in Cl− solution, and the corrosion products formed in the former were thicker than in the latter. The initial corrosion of AZ31B was thus more severe in SO4 2− solution than in Cl− solution, which is different from the typical role of Cl− ions in metal corrosion. Local attack at nanometric scales was observed in Cl− solution, but not in SO4 2− solution. The presence of SO4 2− in Cl− solution mitigated local attack and the corrosion products were more uniform, due to the competitive adsorption effect of SO4 2−.

Evaluation on the Impact of Cache Parameter Selection in Access-Driven Cache Attacks

Cache attacks exploit the hardware vulnerabilities inherent to modern processors and pose a new threat to Internet of Things (IoT) devices. Intuitively, different cache parameter configurations directly impact the attack effectiveness, but the current research on this issue is not systematic or comprehensive enough. This paper’s primary focus is to evaluate how different cache parameter configurations affect access-driven attacks. We build a flexible and configurable simulation verification environment based on the Chipyard framework. To reduce the interference of other factors, we established a baseline for each category of parameter evaluation. We propose a novel evaluation model, called Key Score Scissors Differential (KSSD), for evaluating common private and shared cache parameters under the local and cross-core attack models, respectively; among these are private cache replacement policy, private cache capacity, cache line size, private cache associativity, shared cache capacity, and shared cache associativity. Ours is the first evaluation of the shared cache under a cross-core attack model. As a result of the evaluation, the quantitative metrics can provide a reliable indication of information leakage level under the current cache configuration, which is helpful for attackers, defenders, and evaluators. Furthermore, we provide detailed explanations and discussions of inconsistent findings by comparing our results with the existing literature.