An efficient approach based on trust and reputation for secured selection of grid resources

Security is a principal concern in offering an infrastructure for the formation of general-purpose computational grids. A number of grid implementations have been devised to deal with the security concerns by authenticating the users, hosts and their interactions in an appropriate fashion. Resource management systems that are sophisticated and secured are inevitable for the efficient and beneficial deployment of grid computing services. The chief factors that can be problematic in the secured selection of grid resources are the wide range of selection and the high degree of strangeness. Moreover, the lack of a higher degree of confidence relationship is likely to prevent efficient resource allocation and utilisation. In this paper, we present an efficient approach for the secured selection of grid resources, so as to achieve secure execution of the jobs. This approach utilises trust and reputation for securely selecting the grid resources. To start with, the self-protection capability and reputation weightage of all the entities are computed, and based on those values, the trust factor (TF) of all the entities are determined. The reputation weightage of an entity is the measure of both the user’s feedback and other entities’ feedback. Those entities with higher TF values are selected for the secured execution of jobs. To make the proposed approach more comprehensive, a novel method is employed for evaluating the user’s feedback on the basis of the existing feedbacks available regarding the entities. This approach is proved to be scalable for an increased number of user jobs and grid entities. The experimentation portrays that this approach offers desirable efficiency in the secured selection of grid resources.

Damming the flow: cultural barriers to perceived ‘procedural justice’ in Wonthaggi, Victoria

 Drier conditions in Australia have compelled governments to implement projects such as the desalination plant in the South Gippsland town of Wonthaggi. The desalination plant is still under construction, but South Gippsland is already host to wind turbines and marine protected areas, reflecting public pressure to develop renewable energy sources and conserve resources. However, all projects have been met with vocal opposition. Using the desalination project as a case study, this paper will address public concerns about a perceived lack of procedural justice in implementing such projects. Drawing on data from a pilot survey of 320 residents, we argue that procedural shortcomings of the project include inattention to past political disputes in the region and to the culturally entrenched sense of division between city and country. Attention to political and cultural histories is vital to the successful and ethical implementation of projects in regional areas.

Adolescent victims with an intellectual disability : perceived credibility in cases of sexual abuse

The study aimed to assess perceptions of the credibility of adolescent victims with intellectual disability. Results revealed that victim and participant characteristics influenced perceptions of the credibility of the victim and verdict responses. Findings related to the level of ID, type of offence, perceptions of competency, honesty, suggestibility, and gender of victim and participant.

Establishing trust in hybrid cloud computing environments

Establishing trust for resource sharing and collaboration has become an important issue in distributed computing environment. In this paper, we investigate the problem of establishing trust in hybrid cloud computing environments. As the scope of federated cloud computing enlarges to ubiquitous and pervasive computing, there will be a need to assess and maintain the trustworthiness of the cloud computing entities. We present a fully distributed framework that enable trust-based cloud customer and cloud service provider interactions. The framework aids a service consumer in assigning an appropriate weight to the feedback of different raters regarding a prospective service provider. Based on the framework, we developed a mechanism for controlling falsified feedback ratings from iteratively exerting trust level contamination due to falsified feedback ratings. The experimental analysis shows that the proposed framework successfully dilutes the effects of falsified feedback ratings, thereby facilitating accurate and fair assessment of the service reputations.

Trust ticket deployment : a notion of a data owner's trust in cloud computing

While cloud computing (CC) is a scalable model of shared infrastructure and on-demand computing, it lacks a transparent trust and security mechanism. A data owner (DO) loses control over the data outsourced to a machine in the cloud controlled and operated by a cloud service provider (CSP). This machine is at a location unknown to a data owner. This loss of control over data is further intensified with the lack of managing users' access to the data from practical cloud computing perspectives. In this paper, we introduce a new mechanism of ensuring trust and security in Software as a Service (SaaS) CC. Trust Ticket, with the supporting protocols, is our mechanism that helps a data owner in establishing a link between a CSP and a registered user. In our mechanism, a user first gets registered with a DO before receiving a Trust Ticket and a secret key from that DO. Each Trust Ticket is unique and encrypted. On completing the registration of each user, the DO apprises the CSP of the Trust Ticket. Trust Ticket and secret key are respectively for the registered user's getting accepted to the CSP and having a view of the data owner's data upon a successful verification by the CSP. We have done our experiment in Java network programming by creating an emulated cloud computing framework under the VMware ESXi 4.1 hyper visor based platform. Using the framework, we have evaluated our algorithmic protocol for Trust Ticket. We have also compared our work with prior work. Overall performance of our work is better. We argue that our proposed algorithmic protocol for Trust Ticket deployment establishes a data owner's trust. This trust is established through a data owner's control over data and a registered user, because a registered user is linked with a CSP by a data owner through Trust Ticket.

Infrastructure development using alliances : lessons and observations

This research provides a deeper insight into the performance of Alliances for the construction of road, rail and water projects. The results review 18 public infrastructure projects across Australia that utilized the Alliance form of procurement. The results were based on interviews which addressed the most important management issues impacting on the performance of Alliances. The respondents were selected from a sample of members of the Alliance Leadership Teams (ALT) and the Alliance Management Teams (AMT) that had recently completed a range of infrastructure projects. Results revealed that communication and trust between the ALT and AMT teams was a major issue that impacted on the effectiveness of the Alliance. Further, the research identified several factors that are necessary preconditions for the Alliance to be successful. The study reported on the perceived performance of Alliances to deliver in the key areas that was identified by the client organizations prior to commencement of the project. There are an increasing number of international organizations contemplating construction projects using “Alliancing”. The results of this paper will assist clients in making more informed decisions about the possibility that this form of procurement will be effective in meeting the needs of the project and its stakeholders.

Understanding the conditions of trust in the ALT and AMT relationships in project alliancing

This research also aims to develop a robust trust framework which can improve the understanding of the theory to support trust in alliancing, in particular the ALT and AMT relationship to improve project success factors. Research in trust within the construction industry has not yet examined how the relational signals within the five situations in the normative framework identified by Siegwart Lindenberg affect the level of trustworthiness between partners. More research is necessary to explore potential frameworks that can be used as the basis for future research in trust. Data from previous research in the performance of alliance has been used to verify the proposed framework. The framework will be developed in the ALT and AMT relationship to improve project success factors within the alliance. The originality of this research is trying to understand trust in the context of project alliancing in Australia as there are an increasing number of construction projects using the alliancing procurement method. Additionally, this research is examining the conditions of trust from the ALT and AMT teams specifically formed for the collaboration of project alliancing.

Trust mechanisms in wireless sensor networks : attack analysis and countermeasures

As the trust issue in wireless sensor networks is emerging as one important factor in security schemes, it is necessary to analyze how to resist attacks with a trust scheme. In this paper we categorize various types of attacks and countermeasures related to trust schemes in WSNs. Furthermore, we provide the development of trust mechanisms, give a short summarization of classical trust methodologies and emphasize the challenges of trust scheme in WSNs. An extensive literature survey is presented by summarizing state-of-the-art trust mechanisms in two categories: secure routing and secure data. Based on the analysis of attacks and the existing research, an open field and future direction with trust mechanisms in WSNs is provided.