Recent Advances in Communications and Networking Technology (Formerly Recent Patents on Telecommunication) (Discontinued) - Volume 6, Issue 1, 2017

Background: While smart objects are present in our cities everywhere, the real aim of the Internet of Things is not turned into reality yet. Each smart object is still designated to a specific task and requires proprietary procedures for interaction. Thus, it becomes more necessary to have a connection platform for abstracting the complexity of smart objects and to present their data to the end-users through a simpler interaction procedure. Objective: This paper aims at defining a model that represents a connection/interaction layer between smart objects and people, building a more intuitive human interface towards the Internet of Things. Method: We propose an immersive virtual platform, able to engage end-users and let them be aware of the following strategic factors: where smart objects are deployed in the city, what features/data they offer, and how this data represents context for the urban areas. Results: We have developed and tested a prototypical Virtual Environment of Things, within an immersive 3D environment in which the user can explore the virtualized urban area and interact with the available smart objects through gestures and affordable Virtual Reality devices. The virtual environment is fed by real-time data produced by a multiprotocol sensing middleware that simplifies the interaction with physical devices through high-level RESTful APIs. Conclusion: Paying attention to interconnection of people and things, this prototype empowers final users with engaging tools in order to enhance the fruition of the IoT paradigm. The developed system was compared with existing solutions and fully tested in a real scenario.

Objectives: The paper presents performance analysis of centralised and decentralised architecture of IoT sensor networks. Two most popular security mechanisms for Sensor Networks based on their energy consumption, which may lead to poor performance of the IoT system, are also evaluated. The Internet of Things (IoT) technology aims to improve easy access to the information needed using devices. Observations: It has been adopted by many time sensitive systems like self-driving car, automated traffic control system and so on. However, more study is required to understand performance level of possible IoT architectures over others. Results: This paper explains different IoT sensor network architectures and models decentralised Wireless Senor Networks (WSN) architecture. Simulation of these architectures and their popular security primitives are compared in terms of their performance. This study can be a great resource to develop an efficient IoT architecture and security framework with better performance.

Background: Predicting attacker's behavior plays an important role in network security assessment. Attack graphs systematically classify the possible intrusion paths against a system. For our purpose, we assume the attack graph structure comprised of states and transitions between them. Each state represents an attack phase (or adversarial action) and each transition indicates a possible action of attacker. Objective: In this paper, we use the attack graph structure to propose a new method for predicting the behavior of attackers. The goal of this method is to measure how attackers with different level of capabilities, access and budget prefer to select their path to conduct an attack. Method: In the proposed method, attackers are considered as active agents with different levels of skill, access and budget. All possible attack scenarios are modeled by using the attack graph structure. The attack graph model is parameterized by appropriate data such as the access complexity, the required skill and the required budget as the inputs of the model. Results: The outputs of the proposed method are the desired security metrics such as the selection probabilities of different attack scenarios and the attractiveness degree of attack paths from the attacker’s point of view. Conclusion: One of the main preferences of attackers is due to the lack of the experience and security education of the users. The local and physical attacks have not high priority for attackers to launch an attack. The user’s systems and workstations are more vulnerable than the data server.

Aims: Software Test Suite Optimization (TSO) is a common approach for generating efficient test data in lesser time. This paper presents an efficient methodology for automatic generation of independent paths and TSO with the help of Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) investigating technique. Method: The proposed work combines both global search methods (by scout bees) and local search methods (performed by employee bees and onlooker bees). The parallel behaviour of these three bees makes the generation of independent paths and software TSO faster. Observation: The proposed novel approach is compared with other population-based approaches such as Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Ant Colony Optimization (ACO). It is analysed and validated using 30 Java programs and the results show that it outperforms the other approaches on the basis of execution time and percentage of optimization. Results: The study presents sophisticated concept in a simplified form that should be beneficial to both researchers and practitioners involved in solving TSO problems.

Aims: Network security commonly uses internet protocol (IP) filtering solutions. Anonymous proxies (anonymizers) act as a gateway to the resource, meaning that filters will be bypassed, another feature of anonymizers is that they will not give out the user's IP address or any other detail about the user, the network will see the request come from the anonymizer service. Objectives: This leads to a large range of potential risks from internal users accessing the filtered content or attacks from these proxies on the network. Method: We outline a system to detect the use of anonymizers via incoming connections. Conclusion: The data being used to determine the use of an anonymizer is the media access control (MAC) address, the IP address, the ports used, and destination address

History: The countries of the European Union have faced one of the worst financial and economic crises of the recent history. The crisis impacts several social - economic indicators with multiple effects on societies and market sectors such as the Information and Communication Sector (ICT), which has been identified as a key factor for social and economic growth. Objectives: Although there are several studies that deal with the implication of the crisis, only few analyze the implications of the financial and economic crisis to the growth of ICT sector. Therefore, the scope of this paper is to explore the correlation, if any, between the impacts of the financial crisis and the growth of ICT sector, giving emphasis to the penetration of broadband services, as well as, coverage of broadband networks both of the fixed and mobile markets. Method: The analysis is mainly based on the examination of several quantitative indicators relevant to ICT sector over the period of crisis. Conclusion: The findings of this paper strongly indicate that although there is no strong correlation, from statistical point of view, between the impacts of the crisis and the growth of ICT sector, a more qualitative based analysis reveals the influences of the crisis on that sector. More specific, the financial crisis slowed up the penetration of mobile broadband service penetration, as well as the level of network investments and the reve-nues of operators/providers.