Deniable Authenticated Key Establishment for Internet Protocols

We propose two public-key schemes to achieve “deniable authentication” for the Internet Key Exchange (IKE). Our protocols can be implemented using different concrete mechanisms and we discuss different options; in particular we suggest solutions based on elliptic curve pairings. The protocol designs use the modular construction method of Canetti and Krawczyk which provides the basis for a proof of security. Our schemes can, in some situations, be more efficient than existing IKE protocols as well as having stronger deniability properties.

A maintenance-data-model of enterprise resource planning

Two distinct maintenance-data-models are studied: a government Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) maintenance-data-model, and the Software Engineering Industries (SEI) maintenance-data-model. The objective is to: (i) determine whether the SEI maintenance-data-model is sufficient in the context of ERP (by comparing with an ERP case), (ii) identify whether the ERP maintenance-data-model in this study has adequately captured the essential and common maintenance attributes (by comparing with the SEI), and (iii) proposed a new ERP maintenance-data-model as necessary. Our findings suggest that: (i) there are variations to the SEI model in an ERP-context, and (ii) there are rooms for improvements in our ERP case’s maintenance-data-model. Thus, a new ERP maintenance-data-model capturing the fundamental ERP maintenance attributes is proposed. This model is imperative for: (i) enhancing the reporting and visibility of maintenance activities, (ii) monitoring of the maintenance problems, resolutions and performance, and (iii) helping maintenance manager to better manage maintenance activities and make well-informed maintenance decisions.

Data mining for lifetime prediction of metallic components

The ability to accurately predict the lifetime of building components is crucial to optimizing building design, material selection and scheduling of required maintenance. This paper discusses a number of possible data mining methods that can be applied to do the lifetime prediction of metallic components and how different sources of service life information could be integrated to form the basis of the lifetime prediction model

SKMA - A Key Management Architecture for SCADA Systems

Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems are widely used in the management of critical infrastructure such as electricity and water distrubution systems. Currently there is little understanding of how to best protect SCADA systems from malicious attacks. We review the constraints and requirements for SCADA security and propose a suitable architecture (SKMA) for secure SCADA communications. The architecture includes a proposed key management protocol (SKMP). We compare the architecture with a previous proposal from Sandia Labs.