Project Description Autonomous and connected vehicles will be a part of reality in the near future. There are many development efforts currently underway to pave the way for the deployment of autonomous vehicles (self-driving cars) in public areas. These vehicles are a collection of complex and sophisticated computational architectures. Cybersecurity is among many challenges that … full description “Autonomous Cars – Evaluation of Security Countermeasures (available)”
Supervisor: Kostas Markantonakis
Active: updated 3-AUG-2021 (OSAA035) no expiry
Blockchain to provide Data Provenance Integrity and Privacy (completed)
Blockchain, also part of the cryptocurrencies, can be viewed as a potentially shared/semi-shared/private, the immutable ledger for recording sequence of events or history of transactions. The blockchain technology can be deployed to provide a high-degree of trust, accountability, and transparency associated with a set of transactions/events – especially log files and data provenance. Data provenance … full description “Blockchain to provide Data Provenance Integrity and Privacy (completed)”
Building a Full Causality Chain Across an Enterprise System (completed)
Data Provenance refers to records of the inputs, entities, systems and process that influence data of interest, providing a historical record of the data and its origins. To provide a holistic view of the data provenance in an enterprise system, the provenance records of the activities carried out on a client workstation is important. Last … full description “Building a Full Causality Chain Across an Enterprise System (completed)”
Building Data Provenance from Database Log Files (completed)
Databases are an integral part of any organisations operations. They act as storage repositories for a large set of data that the respective organisation relies upon for their efficient operations. One of the commonly deployed and open source database application is MySQL. It collects and stores a large set of log files related to the … full description “Building Data Provenance from Database Log Files (completed)”
Carbon Labelling – Blockchain based product carbon footprint system. (available)
Project Description Carbon footprint associated with a product is a combination of the emission-related in the manufacturing and logistics of the product. Logistics plays a vital role in moving products from factories to home and is one of the significant causes of carbon emission in Europe. Besides this, the last mile delivery network is also … full description “Carbon Labelling – Blockchain based product carbon footprint system. (available)”
Corporate Transparency – Enabling Consumers Track and Vet their Data Usage (available)
Project Description Data, primarily related to consumers is a crucial part of the modern tech-companies like Google, Facebook, Instagram, and non-tech-companies (superstores, insurance companies, etc.) alike have now started to rely heavily on consumer data for various commercial activities. Although the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) enhances the rights of the consumers from a technical … full description “Corporate Transparency – Enabling Consumers Track and Vet their Data Usage (available)”
COVID-19 – Mobile phone based passport applications (available)
Project Description We have all been affected by COVID19. Amongst the main driving forces for reopening international borders and enabling traveling is the existence of COVID19 immunity passports. However, there are serious considerations around the overall trust, security, privacy but also ethical dimensions of such proposals. This project aims to take into account the views … full description “COVID-19 – Mobile phone based passport applications (available)”
Data Provenance for Multi-Database Servers Enterprise Architecture (completed)
Enterprise architecture, with increasing frequencies, is based on multiple databases that split the enterprise data among itself and store them on separate database servers. Such a scheme enables an effective load balancing and management of enterprise data. However, my splitting data over multiple databases make it challenging to build a unified data provenance view of … full description “Data Provenance for Multi-Database Servers Enterprise Architecture (completed)”
Decentralised Autonomous Economy of Things – Putting rational actors back into Economy (completed)
Project Description Internet of Things (IoT) and distributed ledger technologies are part of the movement to develop the device-specific decentralised economy. Example of such a service is decentralised energy grids that couple together the smart contracts and smart-meter technology to provide traceability and verification of energy sources, efficient peer-to-peer trading of energy. One such proposal … full description “Decentralised Autonomous Economy of Things – Putting rational actors back into Economy (completed)”
Decentralised Cloud – Building an All-Purpose Execution Platform on Blockchain (completed)
Project Description Blockchain and distributed ledger technology have invigorated the decentralised architectures. The positives of a decentralised architecture are that it is distributed widely and challenging to launch a DDoS against such a network. Besides that, the immutability and strong traceability/trackability of blockchain technologies can be considered as a foundation for designing a secure, reliable, … full description “Decentralised Cloud – Building an All-Purpose Execution Platform on Blockchain (completed)”
Detecting money laundering in cryptocurrency economy (available)
Project Description Cryptocurrency networks are unique in a way that all the transactions are public. All payers and receivers are known, and their respective pseudonyms are public. Whereas the inherent anonymity enabled by the pseudonyms and privacy-preserving protocols, cryptocurrency can be argued to be a suitable platform for money laundering activities. In this project, the … full description “Detecting money laundering in cryptocurrency economy (available)”
Federated Machine Learning – Security and Privacy Evaluation Framework (available)
Project Description User data is essential for many of the modern business operations, especially related to the building consumer segmentation and profiling – for marketing and services personalisation. Dealing with user data has its positive and negatives, especially after the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) collecting and storing user’s personal data. Centralised machine learning approaches … full description “Federated Machine Learning – Security and Privacy Evaluation Framework (available)”
Maritime Cybersecurity (available)
Project Description Connected objects in motion are developing as a significant domain. There are many traditional businesses, like logistics and maritime shipping that have legacy systems, but they are rolling out interconnectivity globally. Today’s shift towards increasing interconnectedness at sea is continuing to enable significant efficiency gains and new capabilities for maritime operations. Running in … full description “Maritime Cybersecurity (available)”
OSN Mining Platform – Building a public dataset for fake news research (available)
Project Description According to the Statista, in 2018 the UK had 44 million (66% of the population) active Online Social Networks (OSN) users. Whereas, globally, active OSN user population is 3,397 million. The most popular reason for using the OSN is to stay in touch with friends and family (42% of respondents) and stay up … full description “OSN Mining Platform – Building a public dataset for fake news research (available)”
Personality Identification Using Online Social Media Networks (completed)
Project Description Personality is a combination of all the attributes—behavioural, temperamental, emotional, and mental—that characterise a unique individual. Ability to identify the personalities of people has always been of great interest to the researchers due to its importance. Owing to the increasing popularity of online social networks there is a possibility of predicting a user’s … full description “Personality Identification Using Online Social Media Networks (completed)”
Privacy issues related to Data Provenance of Database containing End-user Data (completed)
Privacy issues related to the data stored, regarding end-users are well understood and studies. However, a large set of data can also be collected that is not directly related to the user but related to the user data – known as data provenance. Data provenance is the field of recording the history of data, from … full description “Privacy issues related to Data Provenance of Database containing End-user Data (completed)”
Real-Time Consumer Centric Data Compliance Auditing (completed)
When a user signs an end user agreement with an organisation, in return of which (s)he will give his/her data to the organisation the users do not have; a) any mechanism to assess that post-agreement the organisation abides by their own agreement and b) to see the operations carried on his/her data (that the organisation … full description “Real-Time Consumer Centric Data Compliance Auditing (completed)”
Real-Time Enterprise System Compliance Auditing with GDPR (completed)
Data compliance audit is a comprehensive review of an organization’s adherence to regulatory guidelines. Traditionally, security or IT consultants evaluate the strength and thoroughness of compliance preparations – usually carried out once a year. With the enforcement of GDPR upon us, a real-time view of compliance could safe an organisation a substantial penalty (4% of … full description “Real-Time Enterprise System Compliance Auditing with GDPR (completed)”
Security Evaluation of Broadcasting Network – Protecting the Entertainment Media (available)
Project Description With an increase in the use of internet technologies in various fields, the traditional broadcasting industry also started to adopt systems, software and services based on internet technologies to provide their contents to viewers. Most of the connected media devices deployed still tend to have a low-security threshold inherited from the era of … full description “Security Evaluation of Broadcasting Network – Protecting the Entertainment Media (available)”
Side Channel Attacks on GPUs (completed)
Side Channel Attacks on GPUs Project Description GPUs (Graphics Processing Units) are commonly integrated in any computing paradigm, enhancing the performance of systems from gaming to scientific research. Under specific circumstances, the GPU can be shared between applications allowing a spy application to monitor side channels and attempt to infer with potential victims. For example, … full description “Side Channel Attacks on GPUs (completed)”
Siri for Secure Programming – On-fly Secure Programming Assistant (completed)
Project Description Secure coding is a set of best practices for making software (during development) as secure and stable as possible. It encompasses everything from recommendations for cryptographic usage, moving sensitive data, accessing a file system, and managing memory. As the security landscape is always changing, secure coding requires programmers to be up to date … full description “Siri for Secure Programming – On-fly Secure Programming Assistant (completed)”
Smart cars – Accident scene reconstruction (available)
Smart cars have a number of sensors monitoring the status of the vehicle and at the same time assisting the driver. These sensors traditionally monitor temperature, battery levels, etc. They are relatively simple circuits that may also alert the driver for possible vehicle damage. Some of these are also working towards collision mitigation by monitoring … full description “Smart cars – Accident scene reconstruction (available)”
Smart Home Privacy Framework – Giving Right of Data Control to Individual Users (available)
Project Description The smart home is a collection of intelligent sensors and actuators that collect information of their vicinity with varying granularity. The collected data is of various formats audio, video, action (turn on and off buttons) and text, etc. Furthermore, these sensors will be collecting data from every person active in the vicinity. Separating … full description “Smart Home Privacy Framework – Giving Right of Data Control to Individual Users (available)”
Speak to Pay – Voice and Chip Payment Framework (available)
Project Description Payment architectures are in constant evolution, from Chip&Pin to contactless to facial-recognition based transactions. Also, with the advent of smart assistants like Siri, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant takes a cue from their respective users through voice commands. This project will explore the potential of using voice recognition/control as an authorisation of an … full description “Speak to Pay – Voice and Chip Payment Framework (available)”
System Provenance Collection from a Client Workstation (completed)
A client workstation in an enterprise network is used by individual employees. They use this workstation to perform different activities, including accessing the data stored in the enterprise data repositories (i.e., Database). These activities, which relate to accessing the data and then using it on a workstation are the crucial missing element in data compliance … full description “System Provenance Collection from a Client Workstation (completed)”
System Provenance Collection from a Database Server (completed)
A database server is a collection of an Operating System (OS) at its core that hosts a database – accessible from various services and devices in an enterprise network. The activities observed on the database server are of immense importance to show compliance with data governance policies. A crucial element of such a compliance is … full description “System Provenance Collection from a Database Server (completed)”
Transparent Governance – Technology to hold Public/Private Sector to Account (available)
Project Description The costs to society of government corruption and low accountability are staggering. Countries on every continent struggle with entrenched corruption and opaque government processes, from graft and diversion of public funds to non-competitive procurement bidding processes. For several countries, public corruption is their single-largest challenge, costing the loss of funds, loss of opportunity, … full description “Transparent Governance – Technology to hold Public/Private Sector to Account (available)”
Transparent Machine Learning – Shining the light in a black box world (completed)
Project Description Autonomy, based on Artificial Intelligence (AI), is at the very centre of many existing and future innovative and enabling technologies including autonomous vehicles, urban air mobility, smart cities and Industry 4.0. All decisions made by an AI system are based on the underlying algorithm design and its training/profiling set. An AI algorithm whether … full description “Transparent Machine Learning – Shining the light in a black box world (completed)”
Transparent Supply Chain – Know the provenance of products in superstores (available)
Project Description Blockchain platform provides an immutable temporal record which can be utilised to collect transactional data throughout the supply chain. This can potentially offer an immutable provenance of individual goods/products with full traceability from source to store. A transparent supply chain creates an opportunity to optimise supply-and-demand management, build resilience and ultimately enable more … full description “Transparent Supply Chain – Know the provenance of products in superstores (available)”
WebAssembly-based microarchitectural covert channel attacks: capabilities, proof-of-concept, and implications (completed)
WebAssembly-based microarchitectural covert channel attacks: capabilities, proof-of-concept, and implications Microarchitectural covert channels are a threat to data confidentiality in multi-tenant environments (cloud platform, mobile phone, etc.). This type of leakage channel aims at tunnelling information across isolation boundaries (sandboxing, censorship, etc.) by exploiting timing variations during program execution. Indeed, the state of microarchitectural components … full description “WebAssembly-based microarchitectural covert channel attacks: capabilities, proof-of-concept, and implications (completed)”