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Rich, context-aware applications are emerging for mobile computing environments that provide new and innovative services to consumers. Security is critical for the successful realization of this vision. We propose a new method for authentication that utilizes contextual information to overcome the limitations inherent in traditional approaches. We have defined a model that uses contextual attributes to achieve an approach to authentication that is better suited for dynamic, mobile computing environments. We examine the use of trusted platforms to provide assurances for these contextual attributes. Our model promotes the adoption of many revolutionary mobile applications by providing a seamless and flexible user experience that can protect privacy and reduce administrative overhead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study a protocol, called BIO3G, which provides biometric-based user authentication and key establishment in Third Generation (3G) mobile environments. BIO3G provides end-to-end user authentication to the mobile operator, requiring no storing or transferring of biometric data and, eliminating the need for biometric enrolment and administration, which is time-consuming for the user and expensive for the mobile operator. We model BIO3G using process algebra Communicating Sequential Processes (CSP) and verify it using Schneider's rank functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The vision of a landscape of heterogeneous web services deployed as encapsulated business software assets in the Internet is currently becoming a reality as part of the Semantic Web. When pro-active agents handle the context-aware discovery, acquisition, composition, and management of application services and data, ensuring the security of customers' data becomes a principle task. To dynamically compose its offered service, an agent has to process and spread confidential data to other web services demanding the required degree of security. In this paper we propose a methodology based on type-based information flow to control the security of dynamically computed data and their proliferation to other web services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In pervasive computing environments, information gateways derive specific information, such as a person's location, from raw data provided by a service, such as a videostream offered by a camera. Here, access control to confidential raw data provided by a service becomes difficult when a client does not have access rights to this data. For example, a client might have access to a person's location information, but not to the videostream from which a gateway derives this information. Simply granting access rights to a gateway will allow an intruder into the gateway to access any raw data that the gateway can access. We present the concept of derivation-constrained access control, which requires a gateway to prove to a service that the gateway needs requested raw data to answer a client's authorized request for derived information. Therefore, an intruder into the gateway will be limited in its capabilities. We provide a formal framework for derivation-constrained access control based on Lampson et al.'s "speaks-for" relationship. We demonstrate feasibility of our design with a sample implementation and a performance evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a wireless communication network, it is possible to locate a user and track its trajectory based on its transmission, during communication with access points. This type of tracking leads to the breach of a user's location privacy. Prior solutions to this problem enhances user's location privacy at the expense of communication Quality of Service(QoS) degradation. In this paper, we propose silent cascade to enhance a user' location privacy by trading users' delay in silent cascade for anonymity. As a result, it avoids the problem of QoS degradation in prior solutions. Furthermore, we abstract silent cascade as a mix-network based formal model, and use this model to evaluate the performance of silent cascade. Study results prove the effectiveness of silent cascade under different types of QoS requirements. Besides, we also derive the optimal configuration of silent cascade to achieves target anonymity within minimum duration of time. and the theoretical upper bound of a silent cascade's anonymity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing automation of buildings enables rich information streams about the activities of building users to reach networked computer systems. Privacy concerns typically cause this information to be accessible only by building managers and security personnel. However, if appropriate privacy mechanisms can be implemented, then it is possible to deploy location information systems that can contribute to the convenience and efficiency of users. This paper describes a three step approach to privacy-sensitive release of location information collected by building sensors. These steps entail defining an ownership model, defining environment events to be monitored, and creating a sharing model. These steps are described mathematically and then validated through a case study for a system called Janus's Map which provides a location information system for the card reader, door, and occupancy sensors of a modern smart building. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the need for individualized information anytime and anyplace in contrast to the problem of user's right to privacy. The creation and application of profiles is characterized. A extensible middleware approach is proposed to combine independent databases on localization and personal profiles in order to identify the right layer to protect privacy. This will enable telecommunication providers to offer common basic services for the development of a wide range of mobile 3rd party applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The success of Ambient Intelligence (AmI) will depend on how secure it can be made, how privacy and other rights of individuals can be protected and how individuals can come to trust the intelligent world that surrounds them and through which they move. This contribution presents an analysis of ambient intelligence scenarios, particularly in regard to AmI's impacts on and implications for individual privacy. The analysis draws on our review of more than 70 AmI projects, principally in Europe. It notes the visions as well as the specifics of typical AmI scenarios. Several conclusions can be drawn from the analysis, not least of which is that most AmI scenarios depict a rather too sunny view of our technological future. Finally, reference is made to the SWAMI project (Safeguards in a World of Ambient Intelligence) which, inter alia, has constructed "dark" scenarios, as we term them, to show how things can go wrong in AmI and where safeguards are needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most security protocols for wireless sensor networks (WSN) assume that the adversary can gain full control over a sensor node through direct physical access (node capture attack). But so far the amount of effort an attacker has to undertake in a node capture attack is unknown. In our project we evaluate different physical attacks against sensor node hardware. Detailed knowledge about the effort needed for physical attacks allows to fine tune security protocols in WSNs so they provide optimal protection at minimal cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we are concerned with the detection software faults and tampering of the mobile application as well as the mobile device theft. We want to disable mobile device cryptographically once either of these problems are detected. Basically the device needs to receive a new cryptographic key after each pre-set period of time in order to continue function. The mobile application execution integrity is checked by the authority when deciding whether or not to give out a new key. The detection can be done via a run-time result checking when the device connects to the authority. The authority can also proactively examine whether or not software tampering is happening. This paper will show approaches that each standalone can improve the dependability and security of a mobile application. We will show how these approaches can work together seamlessly to form a stronger scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multivariate (or ) public-key cryptosystems (PKC) are alternatives to traditional PKCs based on large algebraic structures (e.g., RSA and ECC); they usually execute much faster than traditional PKCs on the same hardware. However, one major challenge in implementing multivariates in embedded systems is that the key size can be prohibitively large for applications with stringent resource constraints such as low-cost smart cards, sensor networks (e.g., Berkeley motes), and radio-frequency identification (RFID). In this paper, we investigate strategies for shortening the key of a multivariate PKC. We apply these strategies to the Tame Transformation Signatures (TTS) as an example and quantify the improvement in key size and running speed, both theoretically and via implementation. We also investigate ways to save die space and energy consumption in hardware, reporting on our ASIC implementation of TTS on a TSMC 0.25μm process. Even without any key shortening, the current consumption of TTS is only 21 μA for computing a signature, using 22,000 gate equivalents and 16,000 100-kHz cycles (160 ms). With circulant-matrix key shortening, the numbers go down to 17,000 gates and 4,400 cycles (44 ms). We therefore conclude: besides representing a future-proofing investment against the emerging quantum computers, multivariates can be immediately useful in niches. Keywords: Multivariate public-key cryptosystem, efficient implementation, digital signature schemes, embedded system, sensor networks, motes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Logging is a central service in computing systems. It lays the foundation for accountability and audit services in computing systems, as well as for other accessory services. While providing logging services in traditional computing systems is a relatively smooth process, it turns to an intricate task in pervasive computing systems. In this context, we present two contributions addressing this problem. First, we develop an approach to securely log information in marginally trusted collectors. Second, we investigate the question of how to securely delegate our logging protocol to a relay equipped with trusted-computing modules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this workThis work has been partially supported by the Spanish Government through MYCT (Project TSI2005-08145-C02-02, FEDER funds 70%)., we present a vulnerability in monoprocess or monothreaded servers that allows the execution of DoS attacks with the peculiarity that they are generated by low rate traffic. This feature makes the attack less vulnerable to detection by current IDS systems, which usually expect high rate traffic. The intruder can take advantage of some knowledge about the inter-output times in the server to build the attack. We have simulated and tested it in a real environment, obtaining worrying conclusions due to the efficiency achieved by the attack, with low effort from the attacker. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a set of security provisions for node to base station communication in wireless sensor networks. It supports standard security requirements, viz. authentication of the origin of data and confidentiality of data. Additionally we use key evolution to achieve forward security which is of particular importance in the face of node capture attacks. As a bonus we obtain implicit weak freshness without message expansion. We take the typical resource constraints of wireless sensor networks into account. The security provisions can be superimposed on several communication models, such as the epidemic communication model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pervasive computing paradigm assumes an essentially dynamic model of interaction between devices that also motivates the need to discover the services offered by previously unknown parties at an early phase of these interactions. Whereas this assumption is at the heart of many pervasive computing protocols and systems, the necessity of securing service discovery and the complexity of this task have been largely underestimated, if considered at all. This paper discusses the implications of insecure service discovery in available systems and which security objectives should be pursued. The design space for introducing security features into a specific architecture, namely registry-based discovery systems, is then explored and assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we consider a multi-layer mobile ad-hoc network (MANET) composed of several kinds of networking units (such as ground soldiers, tanks, and unmanned aerial vehicles) with heterogeneous resources to communicate and compute. In this multi-layer MANET, we first propose a password-based authenticated group key exchange scheme with members' different passwords. The proposed scheme only requires constant-round to generate a group session key under the dynamic scenario, hence it is scalable, i.e., the overhead of key generation is independent of the size of a total group. We support the proposed scheme with formal security proof. Namely, our proposed scheme is the first constant-round password-based group key exchange with different passwords for the dynamic setting of MANET. Keywords: Password authentication, key agreement, authenticated key exchange, heterogeneous, pervasive computing, multi-layer ad-hoc network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This extended abstract describes an alternative to trusting individual nodes in pervasive systems, which is to exploit the diversity of nodes in such systems to build application ensembles that are collectively trustworthy. These configurations are resilient to high levels of attack, and are not dependent on large pre-distribution key-spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]