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Due to the boom of Internet of Things (IoT) in recent years, various IoT devices are connected to the Internet and communicate with each other through network protocols such as the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP). These protocols are typically defined and described in specification documents, such as Request for Comments (RFC), which are written in natural or semi-formal languages. Since developers largely follow the specification documents when implementing web protocols, they have become the de facto protocol specifications. Therefore, it must be ensured that the descriptions in them are consistent to avoid technological issues, incompatibility, security risks, or even legal concerns. In this work, we propose Neural RFC Knowledge Graph (NRFCKG), a neural network-generated knowledge graph based contradictions detection tool for IoT protocol specification documents. Our approach can automatically parse the specification documents and construct knowledge graphs from them through entity extraction, relation extraction, and rule extraction with large language models. It then conducts an intra-entity and inter-entity contradiction detection over the generated knowledge graph. We implement NRFCKG and apply it to the most extensively used messaging protocols in IoT, including the main RFC (RFC7252) of CoAP, the specification document of MQTT, and the specification document of AMQP. Our evaluation shows that NRFCKG generalizes well to other specification documents and it manages to detect contradictions from these IoT protocol specification documents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates an observer-based state estimation issue for discrete-time semi-Markovian jump neural networks with Round-Robin protocol and cyber attacks. In order to avoid the network congestion and save the communication resources, the Round-Robin protocol is used to schedule the data transmissions over the networks. Specifically, the cyber attacks are modeled as a set of random variables satisfying the Bernoulli distribution. On the basis of the Lyapunov functional and the discrete Wirtinger-based inequality technique, some sufficient conditions are established to guarantee the dissipativity performance and mean square exponential stability of the argument system. In order to compute the estimator gain parameters, a linear matrix inequality approach is utilized. Finally, two illustrative examples are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed state estimation algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the problem of fixed-time consensus tracking for a class of nonlinear multi-agent systems subject to unknown disturbances. Firstly, a modified fixed-time disturbance observer is devised to estimate the unknown mismatched disturbance. Secondly, a distributed fixed-time neural network control protocol is designed, in which neural network is employed to approximate the uncertain nonlinear function. Simultaneously, the technique of command filter is applied to fixed-time control, which circumvents the "explosion of complexity" problem. Under the proposed control strategy, all agents are enable to track the desired trajectory in fixed-time, and the consensus tracking error and disturbance estimation error converge to an arbitrarily small neighborhood of the origin, meanwhile, all signals in the closed-loop system remain bounded. Finally, a simulation example is provided to validate the effectiveness of the presented design method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evaluate the differences between clinical visual acuity (VA) as recorded in medical records and electronic Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (eETDRS) protocol VA measurements and factors affecting the size of the differences. Retrospective chart review. Study and fellow eyes of participants enrolled in DRCR Retina Network Protocols AC and AE (diabetic macular edema), and W (nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy) with clinical VA recorded within 3 months before the protocol visit. Differences and their association with patient and ocular factors were evaluated using linear mixed models with random effects for correlations within sites and participants. Difference between VA letter scores measured by eETDRS during a study visit versus measured by Snellen during a regular clinical visit (Snellen fraction converted to eETDRS). Data from 1016 eyes (511 participants) across 74 sites were analyzed. The mean VA measurements were 68.6 letters (Snellen equivalent 20/50) at the clinical visit and 76.3 letters (Snellen equivalent 20/32) at the protocol visit, with a mean (standard deviation [SD]) of 26 (21) days between visits. Mean (SD) protocol VA was better than clinical VA by 7.6 (9.6) letters overall, 10.7 (12.6) letters in eyes with clinical VA ≤ 20/50 (n = 376), and 5.8 (6.6) letters in eyes with clinical VA ≥ 20/40 (n = 640). On average, the difference between clinical and protocol VA was 1.3 letters smaller for every 1-line (5 letters) increase in clinical VA (P < 0.001). Mean (SD) differences by clinical correction of refractive error were 3.9 (9.0) letters with refraction, 6.9 (9.2) letters with glasses/contact lenses, 7.9 (11.5) letters with pinhole, and 9.8 (9.3) letters without correction (P = 0.06). On average, clinical Snellen VA is 1 to 2 lines worse than eETDRS protocol refraction and VA testing, which may partly explain why clinical practice does not always replicate clinical trial results. Eyes with lower clinical measurements and eyes tested without clinical refraction tended to have larger differences. Considering the potential discrepancies between clinical and protocol VA measurements, refracting eyes in the clinic may benefit patients when determining treatment plans and study referrals based on vision. Proprietary or commercial disclosure may be found after the references. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords 6G; ML; Network coverage area Abstract More devices are being introduced to the cellular network every day, and it is time to think about how the next generation will deal with them. The 6G will bring new ways to think about how to share information and will not rely just on communication with a fixed Base Station (BS). A post-disaster scenario may damage the network infrastructure; the devices need to create an ad-hoc network to communicate in this situation. The ad-hoc network must achieve some of the 6G's requirements, such as communication frequency, data rate, and latency, to communicate with the 6G networks when available. The increase in the frequency used to achieve such data rate has the downside of decreasing the signal range, i.e., for two nodes to communicate, they must be closer to each other. Academia is developing alternatives to increase the network coverage area, allowing devices to further the ad-hoc Access Point (AP) to overcome this drawback. Thus, with this work, we propose CAIN, an 6G routing protocol that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques to increase the network coverage area. Depending on the node's connectivity to an AP, i.e., if the node is connected to an AP or not, CAIN uses different messages to make nodes further the AP to communicate with it, increasing the network coverage area. Hence, if there is no connected node to an AP, it chooses a neighbor with a connection to one to forward the message. Also, if there is no connected neighbor to an AP, the node chooses a neighbor to flood the message until it reaches an AP. To improve its performance, we enhance CAIN with AI techniques, such as Reinforcement Learning (RL), Federated Learning (FL), and Deep Neural Network (DNN). These techniques allow the node to make a better neighbor choice and increase the network coverage area even more. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work that proposes a routing protocol for the 6G scenario that uses RL techniques with FL and DNN to increase the network coverage. With these characteristics, CAIN makes devices further the APs to communicate with it using less energy and storage resources, producing less delay compared to other protocols. Author Affiliation: Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Department of Computer Science, Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 22 August 2022; Revised 14 February 2023; Accepted 22 March 2023 Byline: Ricardo Pagoto Marinho [ricardopmarinho@dcc.ufmg.br] (*), Luiz F.M. Vieira [lfvieira@dcc.ufmg.br], Marcos A.M. Vieira [mmvieira@dcc.ufmg.br], Antonio A.F. Loureiro [loureiro@dcc.ufmg.br]

When controlling cyber–physical systems via consensus algorithms, the robustness issue is of paramount importance because of model mismatching and/or disturbances that generally modify the Laplacian flow dynamics associated to the overall network, compromising the possibility to achieve any expected, orchestrated emergent behavior. To face this issue, the Variable Structure Control (VSC) approach has recently been shown to be an effective tool in designing control protocols over networks, providing robustness and often yielding finite-time convergence. Moreover, VSC further enables the decoupling of simultaneous control objectives where reaching a consensus state is only part of a more complex task, for instance as it happens in distributed optimization. Thus motivated, this paper overviews, from a tutorial perspective, some selected recent advances in the application of VSC with Sliding Modes to design robust consensus controllers in both the leader-less and the leader-following settings. Efforts are also made to unify the notation and to discuss the theoretical foundations of the nonsmooth analysis tools at the basis of their design for a wide readership unfamiliar with these problems and formal tools. To this aim, examples supporting the treatment, and numerical simulations, are given and discussed in detail. Finally, hints for future investigations along with some current open problems are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work presents a dynamic posture tracking control strategy for wheel-legged systems on uneven surfaces. Based on the kinematic model of a wheel-legged robotic system, the expected positions for the end-effectors of wheel-legs are calculated according to posture references and sensor feedback. The position control problem for a general wheel-leg is investigated for the active mechanism to imitate a passive suspension and respond to the external contact forces. The position tracking accuracy of the wheel-leg is sacrificed to enhance the compliance performance under rough terrain. Because of the unique contact state with the uneven ground for each wheel-leg, the position responses are different. As a result, the forces from the wheel-legs to the fuselage are inconsistent, which leads to the risk of posture oscillations. Equipping the wheel-legs with an undirected communication network, a consensus scheme for the robotic system is developed with proven global asymptotic stability to improve the posture tracking property. A novel robotic system is established with Stewart-structured wheel-legs, which are connected by a user datagram protocol network. Comparative experimental results are carried out on the physical prototype to validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. • An improved kinematic model avoiding geomagnetism disturbances is established for general wheel-legged robotic systems. Considering the contact forces, an active suspension controller is proposed for the single wheel-leg to track the desired position with expected compliance behaviors. • Based on an undirected communication topology, a consensus strategy is carried out for multiple ASCs. The CASC fulfills the coordination requirements and active suspension response demands with proved convergency property. • The proposed posture control scheme is applied to a wheel-legged physical prototype. The comparative experimental results between the proposed CASC and our previous studies are presented, which highlights the CASC in posture tracking accuracy and wheel-leg coordination performances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In today's world of wireless communication, the prime point of concentration lies on data security. This depends mainly on proper authentication of users who are intended to connect to the network. with modern day technology, the credentials (password), which the legitimate user send to the access points for his/her authorization, can be sniffed and used to enter the system, compromising the system security. WPA2/PSK (Wireless Protected Access/Pre-Shared Key) has a vulnerability which allows an attacker to perform Man-in-the-middle attack by capturing the handshake sent by the legitimate user for authentication. The captured handshake can be used to recover the password using dictionary attack or can be brute forced. To overcome the short comings of the current system, the proposed method uses Frequency Hopping Technique to secure the MIC(Message Integrity Code) before transmitting it. This method reduces the possibility of brute forcing the password, even if the handshake is captured. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords Internet of vehicles; Handover authentication; Blockchain; Privacy-preserving; BAN logic; ProVerif Abstract The Internet of Vehicles (IoV) can significantly improve transportation efficiency and ensure traffic safety. Authentication is regarded as the fundamental defense line against attacks in IoV. However, the state-of-the-art approaches suffer from several drawbacks, including bottlenecks of the single cloud server model, high computational overhead of operations, excessive trust in cloud servers and roadside units (RSUs), and leakage of vehicle trajectory privacy. This paper introduces BEPHAP, a Blockchain-based Efficient Privacy-preserving Handover Authentication Protocol with key agreement for internet of vehicles, to address these problems. BEPHAP achieves anonymous cross-domain mutual handover authentication with key agreement based on the tamper-proof blockchain, symmetric cryptography, and the chameleon hash function under a security model that cloud servers and RSUs may launch attacks. BEPHAP is particularly well suited for IoV since it allows vehicles to only perform lightweight cryptographic operations during authentication. BEPHAP also achieves data confidentiality, unlinkability, traceability, non-repudiation, non-frameability, and key escrow freeness. Formal verification based on ProVerif and formal security proofs based on the BAN logic indicates that BEPHAP is resistant to various typical attacks, such as man-in-the-middle attacks, impersonation attacks, and replay attacks. Performance analysis demonstrates that BEPHAP surpasses existing works in both computation and communication efficiencies. It is worth noting that BEPHAP reduces the computational cost of vehicles by 2 to 4 orders of magnitude compared to current schemes. And the message loss rate remains 0 at 5000 requests per second, which meets the requirement of IoV. Author Affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Information Security, Institute of Information Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China School of Cyber Security, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China * Corresponding author at: State Key Laboratory of Information Security, Institute of Information Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China. Article History: Received 28 October 2022; Revised 28 February 2023; Accepted 24 March 2023 (footnote)[white star] This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 62272007, the Major Science and Technology Project of Hainan Province under Grant ZDKJ2019003 and the Key Projects of Science and Technology of China State Railway Group Co., Ltd under Grant N2021W003. Byline: Xianwang Xie, Bin Wu [wubin@iie.ac.cn] (*), Botao Hou

Keywords IoT networks; Geographical routing; Void node problem; Anchor node; Orthogonal distance; 3-dimensional routing; Routing stretch Abstract In recent years, several applications of Internet of Things (IoT) have been observed in various areas including environmental monitoring, healthcare systems, cognitive smart agriculture, industrial control, smart homes, intelligent transportation systems, and traffic management. For such applications, wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are generally deployed to gather the sensed data from the targeted application field. In order to transfer the sensor node data to the gateway (sink node), novel routing protocols need to be developed, leading to reduced data transmission delay, high data throughput, and improved energy efficiency across the network. In this context, geographical routing protocol has been considered as a promising approach for the path selection in WSNs. This approach is full of scalability and multi-hop routing is performed using local decisions. However, geographical routing protocols suffer from the void node problem (VNP) i.e., a region where active nodes are not available in the direction closer to the destination. Numerous protocols have been designed to get recovery from VNP in 2D networks which cannot be directly applied to 3D networks. The 3D routing includes the networks deployed in the hilly area, high buildings, airborne region, underground, underwater and so forth. On applying the 2D routing protocols on complex 3D topology, the network may face additional problems like packet looping, routing failure, ambiguity, or increased data latency due to longer path. Further, the majority of geographical routing protocols follow the boundary of void which leads to a longer path. In order to address the aforementioned challenges, this paper presents a novel anchor-based void detouring routing (AVDR) protocol where anchor node is treated as a sub-destination which provides the direct smaller path between source and gateway nodes. The proposed method bypasses the void boundaries and directly connects source to anchor, anchor to destination, or two successive anchors. Further, anchor information is distributed to the desired region to reduce the periodic anchor advertisement process. The effectiveness of the proposed method has been tested over both, real field data set and simulated testbed with OMNET++ simulator. The results obtained over real field data set claim that the proposed method takes only 29.09 ms (ms) for transferring the data on an average. However, this value is 32.37 ms, 34.32 ms, 33.61 ms, 37.20 ms, and 38.73 ms, respectively, using A3DR, EDGR, GPSR-3D, BSMH, and RPL methods. Moreover, it is also noted that the proposed method achieves an improvement of 8.2%, 7.54%, 7.66%, 8.49%, and 8.22%, in routing stretch when compared to aforementioned methods, respectively. This improvement with respect to network overhead is 30.25%, 57.45%, 51.05%, 75.56%, and 58.89% using the proposed method. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Information Technology, Dr B R Ambedkar National Institute of Technology Jalandhar, 144011, Punjab, India (b) Computer Science and Engineering Department, Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology Allahabad, Prayagraj 211004, India (c) Electronics and Communication Engineering Department, Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology Allahabad, Prayagraj 211004, India (d) Faculty of Engineering and Technology, University of Lucknow, Lucknow 226007, Uttar Pradesh, India (e) Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, 781039, Assam, India (f) Department of Electronics Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) Varanasi, Varanasi 221005, Uttar Pradesh, India * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 24 May 2022; Revised 3 March 2023; Accepted 7 March 2023 (footnote)[white star] This document is the results of the research project funded by the Digital India Corporation (formerly media lab asia) under Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Govt. of India, New Delhi. Byline: Naveen Kumar Gupta [guptank@nitj.ac.in] (a,*), Rama Shankar Yadav [rsy@mnnit.ac.in] (b), Rajendra Kumar Nagaria [rkn@mnnit.ac.in] (c), Deepak Gupta [dg61279@gmail.com] (d), Achyut Mani Tripathi [achyutmani9@gmail.com] (e), Om Jee Pandey [omjee.ece@iitbhu.ac.in] (f)

Keywords MQTT; Distributed pub/sub; Topic-based routing Abstract MQTT is one of the most popular communication protocols for Internet of Things applications. Based on a publish/subscribe pattern, it relies on a single broker to exchange messages among clients according to topics of interest. However, such a centralized approach does not scale well and is prone to single point of failure risks, calling for solutions where multiple brokers cooperate together in a distributed fashion. In this paper, we present a complete solution for a distributed MQTT broker systems. We target several functional primitives which are key in such a scenario: broker discovery and failure recovery, overlay tree network creation and message routing. Moreover, we also focus on the case where multiple topics are present in the system. In such a scenario, a single tree-based overlay network connecting the different brokers may not be the most efficient solution. To cope with this issue, we propose a topic-based routing scheme for MQTT distributed brokers. The proposed solution creates multiple overlay networks in the distributed system, each one linking together only the brokers whose connected clients have interest in the same topics. We implement the complete system as an extension of the popular HiveMQ MQTT broker and perform several experiments to test its performance in scenarios characterized by a different publishers/subscribers configurations as well as number of topics existing in the system. Author Affiliation: Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria, Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32, Milano, 20134, Italy * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 30 October 2022; Revised 18 January 2023; Accepted 28 January 2023 Byline: Edoardo Longo, Alessandro E.C. Redondi [alessandroenrico.redondi@polimi.it] (*)

Keywords In-band network telemetry; Network measurement Abstract In-band network telemetry (INT) enriches network management at scale through the embedding of complete device-internal states into each packet along its forwarding path, yet such embedding of INT information also incurs significant bandwidth overhead in the data plane. We propose DeltaINT, a general INT framework that achieves extremely low bandwidth overhead and supports various packet-level and flow-level applications in network management. DeltaINTbuilds on the insight that state changes are often negligible at most time, so it embeds the complete state information into a packet only when the state change is deemed significant. We propose two variants for DeltaINTthat trade between bandwidth usage and measurement accuracy, while both variants achieve significantly lower bandwidth overhead than the original INT framework. We theoretically derive the time/space complexities and the guarantees of bandwidth mitigation for DeltaINT. We implement DeltaINTin both software and P4. Our evaluation shows that DeltaINTsignificantly mitigates the bandwidth overhead, and the deployment in a Tofino switch incurs limited hardware resource usage. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Computer Science and Engineering, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China (b) Department of Computer Science and Technology, Peking University, China * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 10 August 2022; Revised 23 November 2022; Accepted 8 January 2023 (footnote)[white star] Note: An earlier version of this paper appeared at the 29th Annual IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP'21) Sheng et al. (2021). In this extended version, we extend DeltaINTto support monitoring with full accuracy, while still significantly reducing the bandwidth overhead of the original INT framework. We now propose two variants of DeltaINT, namely DeltaINT-O(proposed in our conference version) and DeltaINT-E(proposed in this extended version), that trade between bandwidth usage and measurement accuracy. We also add new evaluation results for both software and hardware implementations. Byline: Siyuan Sheng [sysheng21@cse.cuhk.edu.hk] (a), Qun Huang [huangqun@pku.edu.cn] (b,*), Patrick P.C. Lee [pclee@cse.cuhk.edu.hk] (a)

Keywords Decentralized; Anonymity; Reliability; Routing; VANets Abstract With the recent advances in the automobile industry and the emergence of smart self-driving vehicles, the increasing need for proper and optimal Vehicular Ad-hoc Network (VANet) protocols has drawn the attention of many researchers. Nevertheless, the VANet community has yet to agree on a unified and suitable set of protocols for such networks. One of the major concerns in these networks is security considerations, which are significant because of the specific characteristics of VANet. In this article, we aim to address the location privacy and reliability issues in VANet routing protocols. We propose DARVAN, a fully decentralized infrastructure that provides anonymous and reliable routing in VANets. By employing a distributed database and collective consensus, DARVAN minimizes the exposure of critical data, which is conventionally stored and processed in centralized units. DARVAN is deployed by modifying the I2P protocol, which aims to improve routing reliability and resilience to many adversary activities in VANets. Specifically, with DARVAN, we present an effective and efficient network-level mitigation for Sybil attacks in Vanets. Our extensive simulations on NS3 show that DARVAN performs well in terms of packet delivery ratio, overhead, delay, and reliability compared to the previous anonymous scheme proposed for VANet routing. Author Affiliation: (a) Cyberspace Research Institute , Shahid Beheshti University (SBU), Tehran, Iran (b) School of Computer Sciences, Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences (IPM), Tehran, Iran * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 18 May 2022; Revised 21 November 2022; Accepted 3 January 2023 Byline: Saleh Khalaj Monfared (a,b), Saeed Shokrollahi [s_shokrollahi@sbu.ac.ir] (a,*)

This paper considers the reliable state estimation issue for discrete-time neural networks with the try-once-discard (TOD) scheduling protocol and mixed compensation strategy. For the phenomenon of medium access constraint, the measurement transmitted from sensors to the estimator is subjected to the TOD scheduling protocol. The mixed compensation is proposed to flexibly compensate those missing measurements caused by the TOD protocol. By using a novel polytopic uncertain model, a reliable state estimator is designed, where the gain matrix is determined by two vertex matrices. Then sufficient conditions are established, which ensure the error system meets the stochastic stability and the l 2 - l ∞ performance. Finally, an illustrative example shows the validity of the proposed reliable state estimator. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a distributed protocol for tracking the global maximum supremum (or minimum infimum) of a set of exogenous time-varying signals. Specifically, each agent has only access to one of these signals and, by implementing the proposed protocol, it is able to track in finite-time the maximum supremum (or the minimum infimum) of the exogenous time-varying signals in a distributed fashion. No assumption is made on the network size and, remarkably, the communication graph is directed (possibly switching) with the only requirement to be strongly connected at all times. The behavior of the protocol with open networks is discussed and numerical simulations are provided to corroborate the theoretical findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantum network coding can effectively alleviate bottlenecks in quantum networks thus improving the transmission efficiency and the throughput of the quantum network. Although various quantum network coding protocols have been constructed, most of them focus mainly on addressing the communication congestion issue of simultaneously transmitting single-qubit states via the bottleneck channel in quantum networks. In this paper, a protocol for the quantum two-pair unicast transmission of multi-particle states using quantum time-bin multiplexing is proposed. Parallel entanglement is established in a heralded way between two-dimensional quantum memories (QMs) of intermediate nodes by transmitting a high-dimensional encoded single photon via the bottleneck channel. Then the quantum unicast transmission of multi-particle states can be achieved by using quantum teleportation and the resultant entangled pairs. Additionally, a security enhanced protocol is presented when dishonest intermediate nodes or outside eavesdroppers are taken into account. No alternative measurements are needed to check security. This makes the present protocol cost-effective and efficient. Compared with existing methods, no pre-shared entangled states are required. This provides a new perspective for the development of quantum networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pre-trained models such as BERT have made great achievements in natural language processing tasks in recent years. In this paper, we investigate the privacy-preserving pre-training based neural network inference in a two-server framework based on additive secret sharing technique. Our protocol allows a resource-restrained client to request two powerful servers to cooperatively process the natural processing tasks without revealing any useful information about its data. We first design a series of secure sub-protocols for non-linear functions used in BERT model. These sub-protocols are expected to have broad applications and of independent interest. Based on the building sub-protocols, we propose SecBERT, a privacy-preserving pre-training based neural network inference protocol. SecBERT is the first cryptographically secure privacy-preserving pre-training based neural network inference protocol. We show security, efficiency and accuracy of SecBERT protocol through comprehensive theoretical analysis and experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industrial Internet-of-Things systems suffer from a vast and vulnerable attack surface, raising widespread concerns about shielding IIoT devices from malicious attacks and reducing cyber risks. Device identification is the prerequisite to safeguard IIoT systems. We leverage the observation that IIoT network protocol implementations vary due to different hardware architectures/configurations and design tasks of IIoT devices, which cause the difference in their network traffic payloads. Specifically, we develop a novel neural network to learn the semantic/syntax features among multiple IIoT packets. The neural network has multiple branches, each of which consists of convolution layers, attention modules, and highway units for learning the classification model of IIoT devices. To validate the precision and recall of our neural network in IIoT devices fingerprinting, we have implemented a prototype of the proposed IIoT device identification system. Our results show that our approach achieves 95.8% precision and 95.4% recall, significantly outperforming other classification models. • We propose a novel IIoT fingerprinting approach based on neural network. • We conduct experiments to validate the effectiveness of it. • The results show that our approach can achieve 95.8% precision. • We demonstrate the usefulness of fingerprinting in application. • Our approach is useful in shielding industrial systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During this last past decade, the Internet of Things (IoT) has gained much attention because it encompass intelligent devices such as smart sensors and actuators, which enable a wide range of applications that improve our daily life (e.g. smart agriculture). However, due to the presence of an important number of heterogeneous and resources constrained devices (in terms of memory, CPU and bandwidth) communicating over error-prone and lossy radio channels and often deployed in hostile environments (e.g. war zone), IoT networks are experiencing various network performance problems (e.g. excessive energy consumption resulting from network device failure). In this context, an efficient management of IoT networks is needed in order to ensure good network performances. This has fueled the development of different protocols and frameworks for management of IoT networks. In this paper we present a comprehensive study of representative works on IoT network management. The paper analyzes existing solutions for IoT low power networks management and presents a taxonomy of those solutions. Moreover, this paper also compares existing research proposals on management of IoT low power networks based on different requirements. At the end, this survey identifies remaining challenges for an efficient mangement of IoT low power networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Colombia government wants to implement electronic voting. However, the existing electronic voting protocols only include some of the required security features and Colombia needs a protocol with all these features to ensure fraud-free elections. In this paper, we present the design of SIVP (Secure Internet Voting Protocol), a new voting protocol for electoral processes, based on blind signatures and public key cryptography. This protocol has six phases and provides: eligibility, democracy, privacy, verifiability, accuracy, fairness, robustness, receipt-freeness and coercion-resistant. Also, we compare the number of cryptographic operations per phase of SIVP with other four protocols and conclude that the computational load of our protocol is not excessively high despite including more security features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords Internet of Things (IoT); Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE); Generic ATTribute (GATT); Internet Gateway; Dynamic network; Smart agriculture Abstract Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) is a wireless communication technology for power-constrained Internet of Things (IoT) applications. BLE data can be transmitted via either the IPv6 or the Generic ATTribute (GATT) Profile protocol, with the former supporting dynamic IoT structures and the latter being application-friendly. In fact, GATT requires the data layout to be known in advance by peer devices, in order to properly interpret the received data. In this paper, we introduce DynGATT, a protocol that achieves the benefits of both IPv6 and GATT, by extending GATT in a seamless fashion to support dynamic IoT structures. The key idea of DynGATT is to use GATT descriptors, originally intended to specify data in static IoT scenarios, to also specify IoT systems whose structures may dynamically evolve. Peer devices reading these descriptors will know how to interpret the data of GATT characteristics provided by devices joining the IoT network. Because no additional data have to be transmitted, the connection time is then reduced with respect to classical BLE. DynGATT has been implemented and tested in an agricultural IoT application, with different types of sensor nodes. Our experimental evaluation shows that DynGATT is very power-efficient, despite its added flexibility. Its worst-case power consumption is only around 19.37 [micro]A per data transmission and around 41.37 [micro]A overall. This consumption can be further reduced by using the methods discussed in this paper. To the best of our knowledge, this work is the first to support dynamic IoT structures in a GATT-based setting. Author Affiliation: (a) Independent Researcher, Wien, Austria (b) Internet of Things (IoT) Laboratory, Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Parma, Parma, Italy (c) Institute of Computer Engineering, Vienna University of Technology, Wien, Austria * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 17 July 2022; Revised 3 December 2022; Accepted 3 January 2023 (footnote)1 He was with the Institute of Computer Engineering of the Vienna University of Technology when contributing to this work. Byline: Christian Hirsch [christian@hirsch.zone] (a,1), Luca Davoli [luca.davoli@unipr.it] (b,*), Radu Grosu [radu.grosu@tuwien.ac.at] (c), Gianluigi Ferrari [gianluigi.ferrari@unipr.it] (b)

Keywords Q-learning; Routing; Reinforcement learning; Topology-aware; Underwater wireless sensor networks Abstract In this paper, an energy-efficient Q-learning-based routing protocol, called the Q-learning-based topology-aware routing (QTAR) protocol, is proposed for underwater wireless sensor networks. Unlike existing protocols, QTAR considers the network topology to determine the next-forwarder (NF) candidates along the routing path and adopts Q-learning to aid in the optimal global decision-making of an NF from the NF candidates. In addition, QTAR utilizes implicit cut-vertex recognition to optimize NF selection, alleviating the energy wastage that arises from forwarding data packets away from the sink. In our study, we evaluated the performance of QTAR by comparing it with the Q-learning-based energy-efficient and lifetime-aware routing protocol (QELAR), energy-efficient depth-based routing protocol (EEDBR), Q-learning-based delay-aware routing (QDAR), and reinforcement learning-based opportunistic routing protocol (RLOR) in terms of the energy consumption, latency, and network lifetime. Our results revealed that QTAR demonstrated the advantages of a lower energy consumption, shorter latency, and longer network lifetime in the percentage ranges of 26.08 to 70.12, 22.2 to 50, and 37.8 to 75, respectively, than QELAR, EEDBR, QDAR, and RLOR. Author Affiliation: (a) School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, Kyungpook National University, 41556, Daegu, South Korea (b) Defense Agency for Technology and Quality, South Korea * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 28 September 2022; Revised 15 December 2022; Accepted 3 January 2023 (footnote)[white star] This study was supported in part by the BK21 FOUR project funded by the Ministry of Education, Korea (4199990113966) and the Project 'Development of Distributed Underwater Monitoring and Control Networks' funded by the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, South Korea . Byline: Chandra Sukanya Nandyala [sukanya@knu.ac.kr] (a), Hee-Won Kim [hwkim@dtaq.re.kr] (b), Ho-Shin Cho [hscho@ee.knu.ac.kr] (a,*)

Filtered Smith predictors are well established for controlling linear plants with constant time delays. Apart from this classical application scenario, they are also employed within networked control loops, where the measurements are sent in separate packets over transmission channels that are subject to time-varying delays. Consequently, classical tools for the stability analysis, e.g., for time delay systems, have to be extended to facilitate an explicit consideration of network-induced effects such as packet skipping and disordering of sent packets. The present paper illustrates that the time-varying delays and, particularly important, the packetized character of the transmissions have to be explicitly taken into account for the stability analysis. Three network protocols, which use different packet selection and hold mechanisms, are considered to state criteria for the robust stability of the networked feedback loops with filtered Smith predictors. They are based on the small gain theorem and allow a computationally inexpensive way to check stability for the case with uncertain plant models and bounded time-varying packet delays in the communication channels. • Filtered Smith predictor for packet-based networked systems. • Communication network with bounded and time-varying packet delays. • Three different network protocols (different packet skipping and hold mechanisms). • Easy-to-use stability analysis for uncertain plants and time-varying packet delays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the area of underwater acoustic networking is getting mature and critical for a wide variety of commercial applications, the lack of secure underwater communication standards presents a major impediment for adopting these networking technologies within NATO operations. The NATO Research Task Group IST-174 "Secure Underwater Communications for Heterogeneous Network-enabled Operations" aims to study and to demonstrate secure underwater communications in a holistic approach. In particular, this group's ambition is to define waveforms, network protocols and architectures that will enable underwater connectivity in a secure and interoperable way. To that effect, this paper presents various security concepts and communication systems currently under development that could be included in those standardisation efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increase in digitization is giving rise to cybercrimes. The existing network protocols are insufficient for collecting the required digital evidence of cybercrime, which eventually makes the process of forensic investigation difficult. In the current scenario of network forensics, the investigator with current capabilities can reach only up to the ISP. This is not primary evidence. Currently, available tools work only at the network layer. In this work, we propose a protocol that ensures tracking up to the true source by collecting beforehand forensically sound evidence. The proposed protocol can collect target data from the device in the form of a device fingerprint with the help of an agent process. The proposed methodology will help in proving non-repudiation, which is a well-known challenge in forensic cases. The fingerprint evidence generated by the proposed method has the capability of not getting obsolete even if the criminal tries to destroy evidence. The fingerprinting technique deployed uses a hash tree and generates evidence in such a way that this fingerprint can act as legal evidence. The security validation of the proposed system is done using the BAN logic. Formal verification is performed using the AVISPA tool. The system has been implemented as a prototype and hosted on AWS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The Network Canvas suite consists of three applications: Architect ; Interviewer ; Server. • These applications simplify the collection of complex social network data. • Our work prioritizes flexibility, intuitive design, integrated workflow, and collaboration. Self-reported social network analysis studies are often complex and burdensome, both during the interview process itself, and when conducting data management following the interview. Through funding obtained from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA/NIH), our team developed the Network Canvas suite of software – a set of complementary tools that are designed to simplify the collection and storage of complex social network data, with an emphasis on usability and accessibility across platforms and devices, and guided by the practical needs of researchers. The suite consists of three applications: Architect: an application for researchers to design and export interview protocols; Interviewer: a touch-optimized application for loading and administering interview protocols to study participants; and Server: an application for researchers to manage the interview deployment process and export their data for analysis. Together, they enable researchers with minimal technological expertise to access a complete research workflow, by building their own network interview protocols, deploying these protocols widely within a variety of contexts, and immediately attaining the resulting data from a secure central location. In this paper, we outline the critical decisions taken in developing this suite of tools for the network research community. We also describe the work which guides our decision-making, including prior experiences and key discovery events. We focus on key design choices, taken for theoretical, philosophical, and pragmatic reasons, and outline their strengths and limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A dynamic-distributed structure is designed as a satellite organizational structure. • An improved contract network protocol under the dynamic-distributed structure is proposed. • A blackboard model mechanism is proposed to coordinate the satellites under uncertainty. • An online single-satellite scheduling algorithm is designed. • The applicability of the proposed methods to different implementations of problems is studied. To meet the demand for real-time response to emergent events in the uncertain environment, the multi-autonomous-satellite system with real-time inter-satellite links and on-board scheduling capability has been proposed. This paper focuses on the multi-autonomous-satellite coordination and scheduling problem which is formulated by a novel mathematical model based on the multi-agent system (MAS). To solve the problem, we firstly analyze general organizational structures for the MAS and propose a new dynamic-distributed organizational structure. For these different structures, an improved contract network protocol (ICNP) and a blackboard model (BM) negotiation mechanism are proposed to coordinate the satellites. Then, an online single-satellite scheduling algorithm is proposed to schedule the tasks. In the experiments, we build up a multi-satellite system to analyze the performance of different autonomous coordination mechanisms. Experimental results indicate that the ICNP mechanism can increase the total revenue and reduce the inter-satellite communication cost. In scenarios where satellites could break down randomly, the BM can reduce the revenue losses and the number of task failures efficiently, which proves the good performance of the proposed methods in terms of robustness. The proposed methods have important practicality in the real application of the multi-autonomous-satellite system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords NG-RAN; 5G core; NAS; NGAP Abstract Fifth-generation (5G) networks enable a variety of use cases that require differentiated connectivity, e.g., Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communications (URLLC), enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB), and massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC). To explore the full potential of these use cases, it is mandatory to understand the communication along with the 5G network segments and architecture components. User Equipment (UE), Radio Access Network (RAN), and 5G Core (5GC) are the main components that support these new network concepts and paradigms. 3rd Generation Partnership Project has recently published Release 16, including the protocols used to communicate between RANs and 5GC, i.e., Non-Access Stratum (NAS) and NG Application Protocol (NGAP). The main goal of this work is to present a comprehensive tutorial about NAS and NGAP specifications using a didactic and practical approach. The tutorial describes the protocol stacks and aspects of the functionality of these protocols in 5G networks, such as authentication and identification procedures, data session establishment, and resource allocation. Moreover, we review the message flows related to these protocols in UE and Next Generation Node B (gNodeB) registration. To illustrate the concepts presented in the tutorial, we developed the my5G Tester: a 5GC tester that implements NAS and NGAP for evaluating three open-source 5GC projects using a black-box testing methodology. Author Affiliation: (a) Universidade Federal de Goiás, Goiânia, GO, Brazil (b) IDLab--Department of Applied Engineering, University of Antwerp--IMEC, Antwerp, Belgium (c) Applied Computing Graduate Program (PPGCA), Av. Unisinos, 950, São Leopoldo, RS, 93020-190, Brazil * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 8 January 2022; Revised 3 June 2022; Accepted 12 August 2022 Byline: Lucas B.D. Silveira [lucassilveira@inf.ufg.br] (a), Henrique C. de Resende [henrique.carvalhoderesende@uantwerpen.be] (b), Cristiano B. Both [cbboth@unisinos.br] (c,*), Johann M. Marquez-Barja [johann.marquez-barja@uantwerpen.be] (b), Bruno Silvestre [brunoos@inf.ufg.br] (a), Kleber V. Cardoso [kleber@inf.ufg.br] (a)

Keywords Underwater wireless sensor network; Security attacks; Scyther Simulation Abstract Waterways are used to monitor a variety of incredible occurrences that occur in an underwater environment, such as weather impact surveillance, aquatic life, natural resource surveys, defense activities, and so on. The underwater network and its components are vulnerable to numerous attacks since they are employed to evaluate oceanographic content gathering and future forecasts. Several protocols have been offered to combat these attacks. However, they have all proven ineffective. This study considers an underwater wireless sensor network architecture and designs an authentication technique that establishes a session key for safe communication. Our protocol's security study reveals that it protects against a wide range of serious security threats. We used Scyther Simulator to test security threats and found that the protocol is entirely secure. The suggested protocol's performance is assessed in terms of security features, computation, and communication cost and found to be satisfactory, competing with other relevant works. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Computer Science and Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli 620015, Tamil Nadu, India (b) Department of Computer Science and Engineering, DR SPM International Institute of Information Technology-Naya Raipur, Chhattisgarh 492002, Naya Raipur, India * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 1 July 2021; Revised 10 June 2022; Accepted 1 July 2022 Byline: C Madan Kumar [madansecure@gmail.com] (a), Ruhul Amin [amin_ruhul@live.com] (b,*), M Brindha [brindham@nitt.edu] (a)

Exercise induced performance fatigue has been shown to impair many aspects of fine motor function in the distal upper limb. However, most fatiguing protocols do not reflect the conditions experienced with computer use. The purpose of this study was to determine how a prolonged, low-force mouse clicking fatigue protocol impacts performance fatigue of the distal upper limb for gamers and non-gamers. Participants completed a total of 1 h of mouse clicking at 5 clicks per second. Muscle fatigue and performance were intermittently assessed. RMS amplitude increased for the forearm flexors throughout the fatigue protocol. Accuracy decreased following the first bout of clicking and returned to baseline values after 40-min. EDC and ECU displayed the greatest muscle activity while aiming, producing 11.4% and 12.9% of MVC, respectively. These findings indicate that mouse clicking may not result in performance fatigue, however, high levels of extensor activity may explain common injuries among gamers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developing a highly efficient multi-node media access control protocol tailored for ultraviolet (UV) networks poses a significant challenge. While our team's UV random-access collaborative networking protocol, utilizing time-division multiple access (UVCN-TDMA), has been instrumental, its scalability is hindered by the number of network nodes. To address this limitation and facilitate large-scale UV node networking, this study advances the UVCN protocol by introducing an enhanced collaborative networking protocol known as the enhanced collaborative clustering mechanism (eCOCM). This study examined the impact of network topology, various data services, and the number of cluster nodes on network performance within the proposed eCOCM framework. Additionally, a comparative analysis between the eCOCM protocol and conventional clustering systems was conducted. The findings demonstrate notable enhancements across key performance metrics including throughput, packet loss rate, delay, and channel utilization. Finally, functional experiments were conducted under two distinct network scenarios to validate the efficacy of the proposed protocol. This study addresses the immediate challenges in UV multi-node networking and offers pragmatic insights to steer its development forward. • This study proposes an enhanced collaborative networking protocol based on a clustering mechanism (eCOCM) to cope with large-scale Ultraviolet (UV) node networking. • The effects of network topology, types of data services, and number of cluster nodes on network performance under the proposed protocol were analyzed. The protocol was compared with the clustering system. The results reveal that it achieves improved throughput, packet loss rate, delay, and channel utilization performance. • Functional experiments were performed in two network scenarios. The operational status of the eCOCM protocol was analyzed in detail based on the output and input signal waveforms of the UV nodes, and the experimental results fully confirm the validity of the protocol. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Time cost is an important indicator for evaluating the control protocol of the designed network system. The issue of flocking in Cucker–Smale type models is investigated in this article. Two new switching protocols are articulated to achieve finite-time (FT) and fixed-time (FDT) flocking. Sufficient conditions and the upper bounds of time cost (TC) for flocking are obtained. The influence of parameters and group size on TC is revealed. Especially, the new control strategy proposed successfully reduces the convergence time compared to the general FT and FDT control protocols. • The new switching protocols can ensure the Cucker–Smale type models achieve finite-time and fixed-time flocking. • The upper bound estimation of flocking time cost convincingly illustrates that the models achieve flocking faster. • It is revealed that the time cost is closely related to both the control parameters and the group size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the output feedback H ∞ control is investigated for the networked singularly perturbed systems (SPSs) with Markov lossy network, in which the packet loss probability varies in different modes. A new network mode-dependent round-robin-like protocol (RRLP) is introduced to the networked SPSs, which can dynamically adjust the number of the selected sensor nodes according to the network environment condition. Based on this RRLP and Markov lossy network, a Markov mode and scheduling order co-dependent output feedback controller is constructed to ensure the system control performance. By constructing a novel Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional dependent on the singular perturbation parameter, Markov mode, and scheduling order simultaneously, sufficient conditions of mean square stability for SPSs are obtained, and numerical stiffness is avoided. Finally, a direct current motor-controlled inverted pendulum example is proposed to verify the effectiveness of our main results. • Compared with the conventional RRP, a network mode-dependent RRLP is first introduced into SPSs, by which the number of scheduled sensors can be adjusted appropriately according to different network environments. • Based on the Markov lossy network and multi-node RRP, a novel output feedback controller is designed, which can effectively improve the control performance of system. • By constructing a new Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional dependent on SPP, Markov mode, and scheduling order simultaneously, the sufficient condition of the mean square stability is obtained for SPSs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Constand-round secure multi-party computation enables a group of mutually distrustful parties to jointly compute a function of their inputs in a constant-round of communication. In recent years, the constant-round secure multi-party computation protocol has improved the efficiency of the online phase by completing the multiplication computation in advance of the online phase through the Beaver triples generated in the preprocessing phase. However, the preprocessing phase of these protocols is extremely overhead-intensive and there is room for improvement. In this paper, we propose an active, constant-round secure multi-party computation (MPC) protocol which can tolerate arbitrary n − 1 corruptions. At the high level, we follow the Tiny-OT protocol and the unauthenticated garbling for garbled circuits in the preprocessing phase presented by Carmit Hazay and Peter Scholl (ASIACRYPT 2017). Particularly, we first present a new optimized Tiny-OT protocol for generating Beaver (AND) triples which is more efficient than the previous protocol, and then combine the information generated by Tiny-OT to construct an unauthenticated garbled circuit. To be precise, we also reduce the number of commitments and hash function calls in the correctness check of AND triples, and avoid using additional OT operations to compute the circuit, thus further improving communication efficiency. Our new constant-round MPC protocol has a communication complexity O (| C | Bnk) per party. Moreover, we further provide solutions to the open problem of introducing the half-gate technique into multi-party distributed garbled, which will reduce half size of the garbled table per gate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To evaluate pneumatic vitreolysis (PVL) in eyes with vitreomacular traction (VMT) with and without full-thickness macular hole (FTMH). Two multicenter (28 sites) studies: a randomized clinical trial comparing PVL with observation (sham injection) for VMT without FTMH (Protocol AG) and a single-arm study assessing PVL for FTMH (Protocol AH). Participants were adults with central VMT (vitreomacular adhesion was ≤3000 μm). In Protocol AG, visual acuity (VA) was 20/32 to 20/400. In Protocol AH, eyes had a FTMH (≤250 μm at the narrowest point) and VA of 20/25 to 20/400. Pneumatic vitreolysis using perfluoropropane (C 3 F 8) gas. Central VMT release at 24 weeks (Protocol AG) and FTMH closure at 8 weeks (Protocol AH). From October 2018 through February 2020, 46 participants were enrolled in Protocol AG, and 35 were enrolled in Protocol AH. Higher than expected rates of retinal detachment and tear resulted in early termination of both protocols. Combining studies, 7 of 59 eyes (12% [95% CI, 6%–23%]; 2 eyes in Protocol AG, 5 eyes in Protocol AH) that received PVL developed rhegmatogenous retinal detachment (n = 6) or retinal tear (n = 1). At 24 weeks in Protocol AG, 18 of 23 eyes in the PVL group (78%) versus 2 of 22 eyes in the sham group (9%) achieved central VMT release without rescue vitrectomy (adjusted risk difference, 66% [95% CI, 44%–88%]; P < 0.001). The mean change in VA from baseline at 24 weeks was 6.7 letters in the PVL group and 6.1 letters in the sham group (adjusted difference, –0.8 [95% CI, –6.1 to 4.5]; P = 0.77). In Protocol AH, 10 of 35 eyes (29% [95% CI, 16%–45%]) achieved FTMH closure without rescue vitrectomy at 8 weeks. The mean change in VA from baseline at 8 weeks was –1.5 letters (95% CI, –10.3 to 7.3 letters). In most eyes with VMT, PVL induced hyaloid release. In eyes with FTMH, PVL resulted in hole closure in approximately one third of eyes. These studies were terminated early because of safety concerns related to retinal detachments and retinal tears. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The future network is expected to support extremely large bandwidth, ultra-low latency or deterministic delay, extremely high reliability, and massive connectivity for novel forward-looking scenarios. As one of the most fundamental parts of the network, routing plays a vital role in a well-performed network. Recently, some new techniques using machine intelligence to optimize the network routing have been proposed. Although they have demonstrated great potential to improve the network performance, it is still a great challenge to apply machine intelligence-based routing in real network environment due to the limitations of current network architectures and protocols. Fortunately, the future network research program is on-going for designing new network paradigms, which provides an opportunity to address those limitations. In this paper, we investigate state-of-the-art techniques in machine intelligence-enabled network routing and discuss the development trends of machine intelligence-enabled routing optimization techniques for the future network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most vastly used protocols to protect services traffic like the web and email is Transport Layer Security (TLS). In 2018 the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standardized the latest version TLS 1.3, Introduced a significant enhancement in the protocol performance, and presented some new features. One of the new features is zero round trip-time (0-RTT) handshake mode, where the client can send the application data to the server within the handshake messages before the TLS connection is fully established. However, this application data is replayable. The replay attacks in 0-RTT handshake mode have been studied, and several mechanisms are proposed for protection, these proposed mechanisms are not able to prevent replay attacks when the server functionality is provided by a distributed environment such as multiple servers in a cloud computing environment or a CDN. This paper introduces TLS Guard as a new mechanism that extends TLS 1.3 to prevent replay attacks in a distributed environment. We evaluated a prototype TLS Guard implementation in controlled experiments and showed that its effect comes at the cost of some CPU overhead. More importantly, we showed that TLS Guard is scalable and tolerates faults without any required changes on the client side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords IEEE 1588; PTPv2.1; NTS; Key management; Security protocol Abstract In many areas, such as electrical power distribution, industry or the financial sector, time synchronization of devices in their local network is important. The high requirements for synchronization accuracy are often met by the widely used Precision Time Protocol (PTP), which up to now communicates in an unsecured manner. Attacks on the time protocol can lead to high economic damages, for which reason security is becoming more and more important. The current PTP standard IEEE Std 1588-2019 therefore defines initial security mechanisms to potentially enable checking of the authenticity and integrity of PTP messages. However, distribution and application of these security parameters are not part of the specification, and thus no viable protection exists in PTP so far. In this article, we describe our emerging NTS4PTP protocol, which is under development in cooperation with the IEEE Security Subcommittee to address this problem. It is a practical solution for an automated distribution of these security parameters using a key management system that follows the principle of the immediate security processing in PTP. NTS4PTP bases on the recently released Network Time Security (NTS) protocol and provides basic features for PTP such as group management and parameters updating. In addition, our protocol supports all common PTP modes (e.g., multicast, unicast, 802.3) and can be used in combination with the NTS-secured Network Time Protocol (NTP). Here, we step into the most important details of our protocol, describe the advantages and disadvantages and discuss the security requirements and challenges. The work on NTS4PTP is also available with the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as an Internet draft and a proof-of-concept implementation is already under development. Author Affiliation: Ostfalia University of Applied Sciences, Wolfenbüttel, Germany * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 28 July 2021; Revised 10 March 2022; Accepted 24 May 2022 Byline: Martin Langer [mart.langer@ostfalia.de] (*), Rainer Bermbach [r.bermbach@ostfalia.de]

Keywords Wireless sensor networks; Survivability; Metaheuristics; Fitness function; Clustering; Fault tolerance Abstract Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) remain a hot research topic due to its wide range of application areas like environmental monitoring, military surveillance, healthcare, and disaster management. Network survivability is one of the challenging issues in WSN that needs to be maximized for long-run operation of the network. It can be proficiently improved by effective utilization of available energy since the nodes in WSN operate only via in-built batteries. The studies conducted earlier have mainly focused on the design of clustering and routing protocols to reduce energy consumption in the network. With this motivation, the current research paper presents a novel Energy-Aware Fault Tolerant Clustering with Routing for Improved Survivability (EAFTC-RIS) technique in WSN. The proposed EAFTC-RIS technique intends to select the Cluster Heads (CHs) and optimal routes to the destination in an optimal manner with fault tolerant mechanism. The proposed EAFTC-RIS technique primarily designs Moth Flame Optimization (MFO)-based clustering scheme for CH selection and cluster construction. Also, fault tolerant mechanism is considered to further enhance the survivability of the network. In addition, Social Spider Optimization (SSO)-based routing approach is also employed for optimal selection of routes in WSN. Clustering, routing, and fault tolerant mechanism designs, with multiple input variables, result in enhanced network survivability. The proposed EAFTC-RIS technique was validated for its performance and the outcomes were inspected under various aspects. The simulation outcomes demonstrate the superiority of EAFTC-RIS technique over recent approaches namely, EAFTC-RIS, FUCCAR-GWSO, FBECS, MLSLEEP, and Bee Cluster. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Mathematics, Faculty of Science, New Valley University, El-Kharga 72511, Egypt (b) Department of Computer Science, College of Computer, Qassim University, Buraydah, Saudi Arabia (c) Department of Mathematics, College of Science, Taif University, P.O. Box 11099, Taif 21944, Saudi Arabia (d) Mathematics Department, Faculty of Science, Sohag University, Sohag 82524, Egypt (e) Department of Statistics, Faculty of Science, University of Tabuk, Tabuk, Saudi Arabia (f) College of Computer Engineering and Sciences, Prince Sattam Bin Abdulaziz University, Saudi Arabia (g) Faculty of Computer Science and Mathematics, University of Kufa, Iraq (h) Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Maharaja Agrasen Institute of Technology, Delhi, India (i) Research Advisor, UCRD, Chandigarh University, Gharuan, Mohali, Punjab, India * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 29 January 2022; Revised 11 May 2022; Accepted 14 May 2022 Byline: Romany F. Mansour [Romanyf@sci.nvu.edu.eg] (a,*), Suliman A. Alsuhibany (b), Sayed Abdel-Khalek (c,d), Randa Alharbi (e), Thavavel Vaiyapuri (f), Ahmed J. Obaid (g), Deepak Gupta (h,i)

This paper examines the H ∞ performance problem of the edge agreement protocol for networks of agents operating on independent time scales, connected by weighted edges, and corrupted by exogenous disturbances. H ∞ -norm expressions and bounds are computed that are then used to derive new insights on network performance in terms of the effect of time scales and edge weights on disturbance rejection. We use our bounds to formulate a convex optimization problem for time scale and edge weight selection. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the applicability of the derived H ∞ -norm bound expressions, and the optimization paradigm is illustrated via a formation control example involving non-homogeneous agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article connects mobile terminals through improved network protocols, and connects monitoring devices through improved network protocols in the local area network. At the same time, it can convert mobile terminal requests into requests that comply with improved network protocols and forward them to monitoring devices. Method of three-dimensional feature extraction based on dynamic data. First, normalize the coordinates and scales of the three-dimensional calculus model, and use two kinds of data (voxel representation and pixel representation) to deal with video object recognition. Then construct a convolutional neural network as an input to the network, extract visual information and geometric information, and use deep learning to improve the recognition ability of single-modal features. Based on the convolutional neural network, the geometric descriptor and the view descriptor of the three-dimensional calculus model are extracted separately, and the two feature descriptors are fused in a network to find the association between the patterns. After forming the fused feature descriptor, it is applied to micro Classification and retrieval of integral 3D features. The multi-feature fusion layer can not only learn more distinguishing features of the two descriptors, but also supplement relevant information between the two descriptors. Compared with using these two representations alone, this method produces a much better classifier and improves retrieval efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The Network Canvas suite consists of three applications: Architect ; Interviewer ; Server. • These applications simplify the collection of complex social network data. • Our work prioritizes flexibility, intuitive design, integrated workflow, and collaboration. Self-reported social network analysis studies are often complex and burdensome, both during the interview process itself, and when conducting data management following the interview. Through funding obtained from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA/NIH), our team developed the Network Canvas suite of software – a set of complementary tools that are designed to simplify the collection and storage of complex social network data, with an emphasis on usability and accessibility across platforms and devices, and guided by the practical needs of researchers. The suite consists of three applications: Architect: an application for researchers to design and export interview protocols; Interviewer: a touch-optimized application for loading and administering interview protocols to study participants; and Server: an application for researchers to manage the interview deployment process and export their data for analysis. Together, they enable researchers with minimal technological expertise to access a complete research workflow, by building their own network interview protocols, deploying these protocols widely within a variety of contexts, and immediately attaining the resulting data from a secure central location. In this paper, we outline the critical decisions taken in developing this suite of tools for the network research community. We also describe the work which guides our decision-making, including prior experiences and key discovery events. We focus on key design choices, taken for theoretical, philosophical, and pragmatic reasons, and outline their strengths and limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords WSN; Smart grid; Coverage; Network lifetime; Topology change; Multi-period optimization; Integer programming Abstract The self-sufficient Smart Grid (SG) with two-way data communication among its constituents is proposed as a remedy to the shortcomings of the traditional power grid. Due to their low cost and ease of deployment along with the advanced communication capabilities they offer, WSNs are seen as an important technology for SG applications. To this end, it is important to design energy-efficient communication protocols to achieve a long network lifetime while maintaining the desired coverage level. In this paper, we consider the case where the transmission paths are re-adapted to topology changes as long as the required coverage level and connectivity to the base station can be maintained with the current set of sensors with positive residual energy. We first propose a novel 0--1 mixed-integer programming (MIP) model, and then present two alternative 0--1 MIP models optimizing the network behavior in unit time decomposition with an emphasis on energy consumption. Our study is unique in terms of including topology adaptation due to energy depletion within a holistic solution framework based on optimization methods. We avoid the traditional time until the first sensor dies metric and allow the WSN to continue to function optimally as long as the predetermined coverage level and connectivity to the BS can be achieved with the remaining sensors. We observe that network lifetime can be increased significantly even after a one-time reorganization. Moreover, we analyze how the solutions of the three models differ in terms of lifetime and coverage level. As a side contribution, we show that maximizing the time until the first sensor dies is equivalent to minimizing the energy consumption of the most used sensor for the classical single-period problem, which is not necessarily true when there is an adaptation to a topology change. Hence, we provide a practical tool to determine the theoretical upper bound on the network lifetime with coverage and connectivity-based QoS requirements. Author Affiliation: Industrial Engineering Department, TOBB University of Economics and Technology, Sögütözü Cad. No:43, Ankara 06560, Turkey * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 9 December 2021; Revised 17 February 2022; Accepted 28 March 2022 Byline: Elif Zeynep Serper, Aysegül Altin-Kayhan [aaltin@etu.edu.tr] (*)

Keywords Internet of Things; CoAP; Congestion control; Rate performance; Reliability; Contiki; Simulation; Cooja Abstract The Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) is one of the main candidates for a lightweight communication protocol for the Internet-of-Things. CoAP provides a simple congestion control mechanism based on successive retransmissions and binary exponential timeouts. This simple mechanism significantly reduces CoAP performance especially in networks with high packet loss, and thus preventing an efficient deployment of the protocol. Enhanced mechanisms for CoAP were proposed in the literature. Some considered improving retransmission timeout estimation whereas others focused on augmenting the retransmission procedure. In this work, we analyze deeply main and recent proposals to highlight their shortcomings. Then, we propose and implement two congestion control algorithms IDC-CoAP and MBC-CoAP which improve retransmission timeout estimation for congestion detection, and adopt adequately a rate-based approach for congestion counteraction, while maintaining simplicity required by constrained devices. The two proposed algorithms are evaluated by means of pure simulations considering several network scenarios, and also using the realistic environment Cooja/Contiki. All results show that our algorithms achieve a much better tradeoff between goodput, reliability and overhead. Author Affiliation: (a) LIP6, Sorbonne Université, France (b) Lebanese University, Lebanon (c) École de Technologie Supérieure - GREPCI Lab, Canada * Corresponding author at: LIP6, Sorbonne Université, France. Article History: Received 18 July 2021; Revised 14 December 2021; Accepted 29 January 2022 Byline: Nabil Makarem [nabil.makarem@lip6.fr] (a,b,*), Wafaa Bou Diab [wafaa.boudiab@ul.edu.lb] (b), Imad Mougharbel [imad.mougharbel@etsmtl.ca] (c), Naceur Malouch [naceur.malouch@lip6.fr] (a)

Keywords Wireless sensor networks; Cluster routing; Affinity propagation; Energy efficiency Abstract Due to the limited energy of wireless sensor networks (WSNs), improving energy efficiency and prolonging network lifetime are the key issues of WSNs application. In this paper, we proposed a cluster routing protocol based on energy-aware affinity propagation(CAP). The CAP protocol enhances network performance from three aspects. First, an energy-aware affinity propagation clustering algorithm is proposed, which finds the optimal network clustering topology taking into account the total network energy consumption and load balancing. Second, an inter-cluster relay selection method is proposed for CH relay selection in multi-hop routing. At last, the energy threshold re-cluster scheme is applied to avoid frequent re-clustering that consumes a large amount of energy. The simulation experiments are conducted in two sink node deployment scenarios: sink external(case 1) and central(case 2) deployment. The results indicate that our proposed CAP outperforms LEACH, LEACH-C, and KCE in terms of energy efficiency and network lifetime. In case 1, the first node death of the proposed CAP algorithm occurs in 1114 rounds, which is 61.4%, 64.5%, and 33.3% longer compared to LEACH, LEACH-C, and KCE, respectively. In case 2, the first node death of the CAP algorithm occurs in 1372 rounds, which is 68.8%, 31.9%, and 49.8% longer compared to LEACH, LEACH-C, and KCE, respectively. Author Affiliation: (a) School of Safety Science and Emergency Management, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070 China (b) School of Resource & Environment and Safety Engineering, University of South China, Hengyang 421001, China * Corresponding author. Article History: Received 21 August 2021; Revised 23 December 2021; Accepted 11 February 2022 Byline: Ke Zhang (a), Guang Zhang (a), Xiuwu Yu [yxw_usc@163.com] (b,*), Shaohua Hu (a), Moxiao Li (a)

The purpose of this research is to investigate the use of a communication network utilizing Long Range (LoRa) low-power wide-area network protocol for the telemetry of detected target chemicals. The sensor platform under development allows traditional electrochemical techniques to be executed with a low Size, Weight, and Power (low SWaP) system that is deployable using an autonomous or remote-controlled vehicle. Once in the field, the sensors communicate target chemical concentrations to a centralized gateway through LoRa to an Internet of Things (IoT) network. Researchers are currently deploying the prototype network for field testing of each node's sensing, meshing, and communication capabilities throughout all weather climates. Developing a robust and dynamic sensor network to monitor the environment and provide a live data feed to detect chemicals of interest in the environment eliminates the need for direct human interaction. The low power consumption of LoRa allows the network nodes to be deployed for an extended amount of time on a single battery supply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Geocast routing aims the transmission of a message to a community of vehicles in the same geographical area. The GPS information of vehicles, especially taxis, in a city gives reliable information about the traffic pattern of a city. With the help of this information smart models can be created to use when making routing decisions. In this paper, a smart geocasting protocol, GeoAKOM, is introduced and implemented by using the GPS data of taxis in Bursa city, Turkey. In GeoAKOM, the mobility pattern of city is analized in two levels as in GeoMobCon introduced earlier. In the macroscopic level analysis, the city is segmented into clusters using k-means clustering and optimal paths for a message is generated using these clusters. In the microscopic level, mobility based likelihood value is used to make routing decision. The message is transmitted if the encountered vehicle has a larger mobility based likelihood or contact history based likelihood value than the carrying vehicle as in GeoMobCon. Moreover, in GeoAKOM, the next cluster of a vehicle is predicted with the help of all k-order Markov model (AKOM) by using GPS records of all vehicles. Mobility based likelihood calculations are performed by using this prediction. With these features, GeoAKOM provides a robust solution for the vehicles which do not have large GPS record history and which are relatively new in the system. Simulations on real world taxi GPS data are compared for various number of clusters in terms of delivery ratio, average delay, and hop count by using the ONE simulator. Simulation results show that, GeoAKOM provides promising results when compared with GeoMobCon and the First Contact routing algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In view of the security threats posed inside and outside the network due to the weaknesses of network protocols and systems, power line and wireless converged communications have security problems in communication connections that appear in environments where heterogeneous networks overlap. In order to cope with the problems of network delay and data transmission security in smart grid, this paper proposes an online monitoring security protection method based on edge nodes, which manages user trust under the premise of not leaking grid user data, and establishes a personalized machine learning model. This method not only guarantees users a secure communication experience, but also ensures users' real-time network connection and content acquisition, and can obtain a fast and personalized user experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]