arXiv subjects

Maaruf Ali

Publications and source records attributed to Maaruf Ali.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

The Evolution of Zero Trust Architecture (ZTA) from Concept to Implementation

Zero Trust Architecture (ZTA) is one of the paradigm changes in cybersecurity, from the traditional perimeter-based model to perimeterless. This article studies the core concepts of ZTA, its beginning, a few use cases and future trends. Emphasising the always verify and least privilege access, some key tenets of ZTA have grown to be integration technologies like Identity Management, Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) and real-time analytics. ZTA is expected to strengthen cloud environments, education, work environments (including from home) while controlling other risks like lateral movement and insider threats. Despite ZTA's benefits, it comes with challenges in the form of complexity, performance overhead and vulnerabilities in the control plane. These require phased implementation and continuous refinement to keep up with evolving organisational needs and threat landscapes. Emerging technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) will further automate policy enforcement and threat detection in keeping up with dynamic cyber threats.

cs.CR↗

arXiv2020

Integration of Blockchain and IoT: An Enhanced Security Perspective

Blockchain (BC), a by-product of Bitcoin cryptocurrency, has gained immense and wide scale popularity for its applicability in various diverse domains - especially in multifaceted non-monetary systems. By adopting cryptographic techniques such as hashing and asymmetric encryption - along with distributed consensus approach, a Blockchain based distributed ledger not only becomes highly secure but also immutable and thus eliminates the need for any third-party intermediators. On the contrary, innumerable IoT (Internet of Things) devices are increasingly being added to the network. This phenomenon poses higher risk in terms of security and privacy. It is thus extremely important to address the security aspects of the growing IoT ecosystem. This paper explores the applicability of BC for ensuring enhanced security and privacy in the IoT ecosystem. Recent research articles and projects or applications were surveyed to assess the implementation of BC for IoT Security and identify associated challenges and propose solutions for BC enabled enhanced security for the IoT ecosystem.

cs.CR↗

arXiv2020

Power-saving Asynchronous Quorum-based Protocols for Maximal Neighbour Discovery

The discovery of neighbouring active nodes is one of the most challenging problems in asynchronous ad hoc networks. Since time synchronization is extremely costly in these networks, application of asynchronous methods like quorum-based protocols have attracted increased interest for their suitability. This is because Quorum-based protocols can guarantee that two nodes with differing clock times have an intersection within at least one timeslot. A higher neighbour discovery rate of active nodes is desired, but it also results in a higher active ratio and consequently and adversely more overall power consumption of the nodes and a shorter network lifetime. There must be a trade-off between extensive neighbour discovery and active ratio in order to design high-performance and efficient protocols. In this paper, two novel asynchronous quorum-based protocols to maximize the neighbour discovery and minimize the active ratio have been designed and presented. A new metric (Quorum Efficiency Ratio: QER) has also been designed to evaluate and compare the performance of quorum-based protocols in terms of their neighbour discovery (the Expected Quorum Overlap Size: EQOS) and the active ratio. The EQOS has been theoretically derived, along with the Active Ratio and the QER values for the proposed novel protocols and the other contemporary protocols. Finally, the proposed methods have been evaluated and compared against the other methods based on the current metrics and the new metric.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2020

Performance Evaluation of Orchestra Scheduling in Time Slotted Channel Hopping Networks

In this paper, we evaluate the performance of networks that use RPL (Routing Protocols for Low Power and Lossy Networks) with TSCH (Time Slotted Channel Hopping) and Orchestra (an autonomous method for building the TSCH schedule). We measure the performance in the transient state when a node dies (i.e., removed from the network) and determine how long it takes for the network to come back to a stable RPL tree and also what the impact is with respect to energy consumption. Our analysis shows that the Orchestra reduces the energy consumption when the RPL is in a transient state, like in the case of when one of the nodes die. Furthermore, we calculate the energy consumption in the transient state without using Orchestra, and then we make a comparison between both outcomes. We show that Orchestra reduces energy consumption by up to one-third compared to not using Orchestra.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2020

Blockchain Enabled Smart Contract Based Applications: Deficiencies with the Software Development Life Cycle Models

With the recent popularity of Blockchain and other Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), blockchain enabled smart contract applications has attracted increased research focus. However, the immutability of the blocks, where the smart contracts are stored, causes conflicts with the traditional Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) models usually followed by software engineers. This clearly shows the unsuitability of the application of SDLC in designing blockchain enabled smart contract based applications. This research article addresses this current problem by first exploring the six traditional SDLC models, clearly identifying the conflicts in a table with the application of smart contracts and advocates that there is an urgent need to develop new standard model(s) to address the arising issues. The concept of both block immutability and contract is introduced. This is further set in a historical context from legacy smart contracts and blockchain enabled smart contracts extending to the difference between "shallow smart contracts" and "deep smart contracts". To conclude, the traditional SDLC models are unsuitable for blockchain enabled smart contract-based applications.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2018

Internet of Nano-Things, Things and Everything: Future Growth Trends

The current statuses and future promises of the Internet of Things (IoT), Internet of Everything (IoE) and Internet of Nano-Things (IoNT) are extensively reviewed and a summarized survey is presented. The analysis clearly distinguishes between IoT and IoE, which are wrongly considered to be the same by many commentators. After evaluating the current trends of advancement in the fields of IoT, IoE and IoNT, this paper identifies the 21 most significant current and future challenges as well as scenarios for the possible future expansion of their applications. Despite possible negative aspects of these developments, there are grounds for general optimism about the coming technologies. Certainly, many tedious tasks can be taken over by IoT devices. However, the dangers of criminal and other nefarious activities, plus those of hardware and software errors, pose major challenges that are a priority for further research. Major specific priority issues for research are identified.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2018

A survey on subjecting electronic product code and non-ID objects to IP identification

Over the last decade, both research on the Internet of Things (IoT) and real-world IoT applications have grown exponentially. The IoT provides us with smarter cities, intelligent homes, and generally more comfortable lives. However, the introduction of these devices has led to several new challenges that must be addressed. One of the critical challenges facing interacting with IoT devices is to address billions of devices (things) around the world, including computers, tablets, smartphones, wearable devices, sensors, and embedded computers, and so on. This article provides a survey on subjecting Electronic Product Code and non-ID objects to IP identification for IoT devices, including their advantages and disadvantages thereof. Different metrics are here proposed and used for evaluating these methods. In particular, the main methods are evaluated in terms of their: (i) computational overhead, (ii) scalability, (iii) adaptability, (iv) implementation cost, and (v) whether applicable to already ID-based objects and presented in tabular format. Finally, the article proves that this field of research will still be ongoing, but any new technique must favorably offer the mentioned five evaluative parameters.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2018

Blockchain Enabled Enhanced IoT Ecosystem Security

Blockchain (BC), the technology behind the Bitcoin cryptocurrency system, is starting to be adopted for ensuring enhanced security and privacy in the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. Fervent research is currently being focused in both academia and industry in this domain. Proof of Work (PoW), a cryptographic puzzle, plays a vital role in ensuring BC security by maintaining a digital ledger of transactions, which are considered to be incorruptible. Furthermore, BC uses a changeable Public Key (PK) to record the identity of users, thus providing an extra layer of privacy. Not only in cryptocurrency has the successful adoption of the BC been implemented, but also in multifaceted non-monetary systems, such as in: distributed storage systems, proof of location and healthcare. Recent research articles and projects or applications were surveyed to assess the implementation of the BC for IoT Security and identify associated challenges and propose solutions for BC enabled enhanced security for the IoT ecosystem.

cs.CR↗

arXiv2018

Cross-cultural Usability Issues in E/M-Learning

This paper gives an overview of electronic learning (E-Learning) and mobile learning (M-Learning) adoption and diffusion trends, as well as their particular traits, characteristics and issues, especially in terms of cross-cultural and universal usability. E-Learning and M-Learning models using web services and cloud computing, as well as associated security concerns are all addressed. The benefits and enhancements that accrue from using mobile and other internet devices for the purposes of learning in academia are discussed. The differences between traditional classroom-based learning, distance learning, E-Learning and M-Learning models are compared and some conclusions are drawn.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2018

Applications of Blockchain Technology beyond Cryptocurrency

Blockchain (BC), the technology behind the Bitcoin crypto-currency system, is considered to be both alluring and critical for ensuring enhanced security and (in some implementations, non-traceable) privacy for diverse applications in many other domains including in the Internet of Things (IoT) eco-system. Intensive research is currently being conducted in both academia and industry applying the Blockchain technology in multifarious applications. Proof-of-Work (PoW), a cryptographic puzzle, plays a vital role in ensuring BC security by maintaining a digital ledger of transactions, which is considered to be incorruptible. Furthermore, BC uses a changeable Public Key (PK) to record the users' identity, which provides an extra layer of privacy. Not only in cryptocurrency has the successful adoption of BC been implemented but also in multifaceted non-monetary systems such as in: distributed storage systems, proof-of-location, healthcare, decentralized voting and so forth. Recent research articles and projects/applications were surveyed to assess the implementation of BC for enhanced security, to identify associated challenges and to propose solutions for BC enabled enhanced security systems.

cs.CR↗

arXiv2017

Cultural, Economic and Societal Impacts on Users' Behaviour and Mobile Broadband Adoption Trends

The diverse range of Internet enabled devices both mobile and fixed has not only impacted the global economy but the very fabric of human communications and lifestyles. The ease of access and lowered cost has enabled hitherto diametrically opposed people to interact and influence each other globally. The consequence of which is the dire need to address the way culture affects interaction with information systems across the world. The many facets of which encompasses human behaviour, socio-economic and cultural factors including lifestyles and the way of interaction with the information system. The study group involved participants from Bangladesh and the United Kingdom to ascertain the users'behavioural patterns and mobile broadband technology diffusion trends.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2017

A Review on Internet of Things (IoT), Internet of Everything (IoE) and Internet of Nano Things (IoNT)

The current prominence and future promises of the Internet of Things (IoT), Internet of Everything (IoE) and Internet of Nano Things (IoNT) are extensively reviewed and a summary survey report is presented. The analysis clearly distinguishes between IoT and IoE which are wrongly considered to be the same by many people. Upon examining the current advancement in the fields of IoT, IoE and IoNT, the paper presents scenarios for the possible future expansion of their applications.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2017

Multilingual Website Usability Analysis Based on an International User Survey

A study was undertaken to determine the important usability factors (UF) used in the English and the non-English version of a website. The important usability factors were determined, based on a detailed questionnaire used in an international survey. Analysis of the questionnaire found inequalities in the user satisfaction and a general dissatisfaction with the non-English version of the website. The study concluded that more care should be taken in creating the text, taking into account the cultural and linguistic background of the users and the use of graphics in multilingual websites.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2017

Analysis of QoS of VoIP Traffic through WiFi-UMTS Networks

Simulation of VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) traffic through UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunication System) and WiFi (IEEE 802.11x) alone and together are analysed for Quality of Service (QoS) performance. The average jitter of VoIP transiting the WiFi-UMTS network has been found to be lower than that of either solely through the WiFi and the UMTS networks. It is normally expected to be higher than traversing through the WiFi network only. Both the MOS (Mean Opinion Score) and the packet end-to-end delay were also found to be much lower than expected through the heterogeneous WiFi-UMTS network.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2017

Simulation and Analysis of Quality of Service (QoS) Parameters of Voice over IP (VoIP) Traffic through Heterogeneous Networks

Identifying those causes and parameters that affect the Quality of Service (QoS) of Voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) through heterogeneous networks such as WiFi, WiMAX and between them are carried out using the OPNET simulation tool. Optimization of the network for both intra- and intersystem traffic to mitigate the deterioration of the QoS are discussed. The average value of the jitter of the VoIP traffic traversing through the WiFi-WiMAX network was observed to be higher than that of utilizing WiFi alone at some points in time. It is routinely surmised to be less than that of transiting across the WiFi network only and obviously higher than passing through the increased bandwidth network of WiMAX. Moreover, both the values of the packet end-to-end delay and the Mean Opinion Score (MOS) were considerably higher than expected. The consequences of this optimization, leading to a solution, which can ameliorate the QoS over these networks are analyzed and offered as the conclusion of this ongoing research.

cs.NI↗