| 1. |
- Abbas, Haider, et al.
(författare)
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Architectural Description of an Automated System for Uncertainty Issues Management in Information Security
- 2010
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Ingår i: International Journal of computer Science and Information Security. - USA. - 1947-5500. ; 8:3, s. 59-67
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Information technology evolves at a faster pace giving organizations a limited scope to comprehend and effectively react to steady flux nature of its progress. Consequently the rapid technological progression raises various concerns for the IT system of an organization i.e. existing hardware/software obsoleteness, uncertain system behavior, interoperability of various components/method, sudden changes in IT security requirements and expiration of security evaluations. These issues are continuous and critical in their nature that create uncertainty in IT infrastructure and threaten the IT security measures of an organization. In this research, Options theory is devised to address uncertainty issues in IT security management and the concepts have been developed/validated through real cases on SHS (Spridnings-och-Hämtningssystem) and ESAM (E-society) systems. AUMSIS (Automated Uncertainty Management System in Information Security) is the ultimate objective of this research which provides an automated system for uncertainty management in information security. The paper presents the architectural description of AUMSIS, its various components, information flow, storage and information processing details using options valuation techniques. It also presents heterogeneous information retrieval problems and their solution. The architecture is validated with examples from SHS system
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| 2. |
- Abbas, Haider, et al.
(författare)
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Addressing Dynamic Issues in Information Security Management
- 2011
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Ingår i: Information Management & Computer Security. - UK : Emerald Group Publishing Limited. - 0968-5227 .- 1758-5805. ; 19:1, s. 5-24
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Ett ramverk för behandling av osäkerhet inom ledningssystem för informationssäkerhet presenteras. Ramverket baseras på teorier från corporate finance. En fallstudie visar hur ramverket kan appliceras.
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| 3. |
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| 4. |
- Abbas, Haider, et al.
(författare)
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A Structured Approach for Internalizing Externalities Caused by IT Security Mechanisms
- 2010
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Ingår i: IEEE ETCS 2010. - Wuhan, China. ; , s. 149-153
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Organizations relying on Information Technology for their business processes have to employ various Security Mechanisms (Authentication, Authorization, Hashing, Encryption etc) to achieve their organizational security objectives of data confidentiality, integrity and availability. These security mechanisms except from their intended role of increased security level for this organization may also affect other systems outside the organization in a positive or negative manner called externalities. Externalities emerge in several ways i.e. direct cost, direct benefit, indirect cost and indirect benefit. Organizations barely consider positive externalities although they can be beneficial and the negative externalities that could create vulnerabilities are simply ignored. In this paper, we will present an infrastructure to streamline information security externalities that appear dynamically for an organization
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| 5. |
- Abbas, Haider, 1979-
(författare)
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Options-Based Security-Oriented Framework for Addressing Uncerainty Issues in IT Security
- 2010
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Continuous development and innovation in Information Technology introduces novel configuration methods, software development tools and hardware components. This steady state of flux is very desirable as it improves productivity and the overall quality of life in societies. However, the same phenomenon also gives rise to unseen threats, vulnerabilities and security concerns that are becoming more critical with the passage of time. As an implication, technological progress strongly impacts organizations’ existing information security methods, policies and techniques, making obsolete existing security measures and mandating reevaluation, which results in an uncertain IT infrastructure. In order to address these critical concerns, an options-based reasoning borrowed from corporate finance is proposed and adapted for evaluation of security architecture and decision- making to handle them at organizational level. Options theory has provided significant guidance for uncertainty management in several domains, such as Oil & Gas, government R&D and IT security investment projects. We have applied options valuation technique in a different context to formalize optimal solutions in uncertain situations for three specific and identified uncertainty issues in IT security. In the research process, we formulated an adaptation model for expressing options theory in terms useful for IT security which provided knowledge to formulate and propose a framework for addressing uncertainty issues in information security. To validate the efficacy of this proposed framework, we have applied this approach to the SHS (Spridnings- och Hämtningssystem) and ESAM (E-Society) systems used in Sweden. As an ultimate objective of this research, we intend to develop a solution that is amenable to automation for the three main problem areas caused by technological uncertainty in information security: i) dynamically changing security requirements, ii) externalities caused by a security system, iii) obsoleteness of evaluation. The framework is general and capable of dealing with other uncertainty management issues and their solutions, but in this work we primarily deal with the three aforementioned uncertainty problems. The thesis presents an in-depth background and analysis study for a proposed options-based security-oriented framework with case studies for SHS and ESAM systems. It has also been assured that the framework formulation follows the guidelines from industry best practices criteria/metrics. We have also proposed how the whole process can be automated as the next step in development.
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| 6. |
- Abbas, Haider, et al.
(författare)
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Security Evaluation of IT Products : Bridging the Gap between Common Criteria (CC) and Real Option Thinking
- 2008
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Ingår i: WCECS 2008. - 9789889867102 ; , s. 530-533
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Information security has long been considered as a key concern for organizations benefiting from the electronic era. Rapid technological developments have been observed in the last decade which has given rise to novel security threats, making IT, an uncertain infrastructure. For this reason, the business organizations have an acute need to evaluate the security aspects of their IT infrastructure. Since many years, CC (Common Criteria) has been widely used and accepted for evaluating the security of IT products. It does not impose predefined security rules that a product should exhibit but a language for security evaluation. CC has certain advantages over ITSEC1, CTCPEC2 and TCSEC3 due to its ability to address all the three dimensions: a) it provides opportunity for users to specify their security requirements, b) an implementation guide for the developers and c) provides comprehensive criteria to evaluate the security requirements. Among the few notable shortcomings of CC is the amount of resources and a lot of time consumption. Another drawback of CC is that the security requirements in this uncertain IT environment must be defined before the project starts. ROA is a well known modern methodology used to make investment decisions for the projects under uncertainty. It is based on options theory that provides not only strategic flexibility but also helps to consider hidden options during uncertainty. ROA comes in two flavors: first for the financial option pricing and second for the more uncertain real world problems where the end results are not deterministic. Information security is one of the core areas under consideration where researchers are employing ROA to take security investment decisions. In this paper, we give a brief introduction of ROA and its use in various domains. We will evaluate the use of Real options based methods to enhance the Common Criteria evaluation methodology to manage the dynamic security requirement specification and reducing required time and resources. We will analyze the possibilities to overcome CC limitations from the perspective of the end user, developer and evaluator. We believe that with the ROA enhanced capabilities will potentially be able to stop and possibly reverse this trend and strengthen the CC usage with a more effective and responsive evaluation methodology.
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| 7. |
- Abbas, Haider, et al.
(författare)
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Adaptability Infrastructure for Bridging IT Security Evaluation and Options Theory
- 2009
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Ingår i: ACM- IEEE SIN 2009 International Conference on Security of Information and Networks. - North Cyprus : ACM Press. - 9781605584126
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The constantly rising threats in IT infrastructure raise many concerns for an organization, altering security requirements according to dynamically changing environment, need of midcourse decision management and deliberate evaluation of security measures are most striking. Common Criteria for IT security evaluation has long been considered to be victimized by uncertain IT infrastructure and considered resource hungry, complex and time consuming process. Considering this aspect we have continued our research quest for analyzing the opportunities to empower IT security evaluation process using Real Options thinking. The focus of our research is not only the applicability of real options analysis in IT security evaluation but also observing its implications in various domains including IT security investments and risk management. We find it motivating and worth doing to use an established method from corporate finance i.e. real options and utilize its rule of thumb technique as a road map to counter uncertainty issues for evaluation of IT products. We believe employing options theory in security evaluation will provide the intended benefits. i.e. i) manage dynamically changing security requirements ii) accelerating evaluation process iii) midcourse decision management. Having all the capabilities of effective uncertainty management, options theory follows work procedures based on mathematical calculations quite different from information security work processes. In this paper, we will address the diversities between the work processes of security evaluation and real options analysis. We present an adaptability infrastructure to bridge the gap and make them coherent with each other. This liaison will transform real options concepts into a compatible mode that provides grounds to target IT security evaluation and common criteria issues. We will address ESAM system as an example for illustrations and applicability of the concepts.
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