Branch Meeting Presentations

Run silent, run deep: today's threat landscape
David Emm, Senior Technology Consultant, Kaspersky Lab (13th May 2008)
Today's viruses, worms and Trojans are no longer isolated acts of hi-tech vandalism. In the last four years we've seen the increasing criminalization of the Internet, with malicious code being tailored specifically for the criminal underground to make money illegally. So-called 'bot' networks made up of Trojans are used to steal confidential data, to launch Distributed-Denial-of-Service attacks, to distribute spam or to download still more malicious code from remote web sites. With this has also come a shift in tactics from the writers of malicious code. We've seen a decline in the number of global epidemics as malware authors move away from the use of mass attacks on victims worldwide to low-key, localised attacks that make fewer headlines but more money.
Presentation notes in PDF format (939KB).
Watch the presentation from our streaming server (link should open in Windows Media Player)

Health Informatics (HI): what's all the fuss about?
Dr Max Hughes (29th April 2008)
Max Hughes is a doctor working in mental health in the South West. His initial involvement with HI began in 2003, when he first became involved with intranet development. Since then, his interests include supporting other clinical staff in the effective use of healthcare information systems as well as looking at the ways Information Technologies can drive Quality Improvement in Healthcare.
Presentation notes in PDF format (843KB).
Watch the presentation from our streaming server (link should open in Windows Media Player)

ProBlogging: Money, Metrics and Mentalism in the Long-Tail world of the Web
Dr Michael Evans, University of Reading (17th March 2008)
ProBlogging is the art of writing professional blogs to a wide web audience for profit. Thanks largely to innovations in the online advertising business, professionally written blogs can now earn significant income if implemented correctly.
This presentation will focus on the evolution of Dr. Evans's own ProBlog, MobileMentalism.com, which, over the past two years, has gained a readership of over 160,000 unique visitors per month, and which generates an extremely healthy profit. The presentation will discuss the various components of ProBlogging, showing how it is a fascinating blend of art and science, craft and technology, and will give an insight into the underlying dynamics of the Web that makes ProBlogging both possible and successful.
Presentation notes in PDF format (1.7MB).
Watch the presentation from our streaming server (link should open in Windows Media Player - please note the final 10 minutes of the presentation were not recorded)

Turning IT Security Inside Out
Jon Collins, Freeform Dynamics (12th February 2008)
The IT security industry has typically wanted us to focus on the threat of hackers, spammers and other undesirables from distant countries that want to break through the corporate firewall and wreak all kinds of havoc. But just how accurate a picture is this – or rather, how closely should we be scrutinising the actions of ourselves and our colleagues, to protect against not just malicious acts but also the potential for accidental damage? Against a background of organisations looking to remove, rather than build up their perimeters to enable better interworking with suppliers and customers, this presentation considers how to balance the risks of outsider damage whilst mitigating the threats from within.
Presentation notes in PDF format (582KB).
Watch the presentation from our streaming server (link should open in Windows Media Player)

The impact of IT on the Marine Navigator
Andrew Eccleston PhD FRMetS CMet MNI FHEA , School of Earth, Ocean and Environmental Sciences, University of Plymouth (16th January 2008)
Andrew Eccleston is a member of academic staff at the University of Plymouth where he teaches students who are aiming for a career at sea, either as Merchant Navy deck officers or in the professional yachting industry.
Andrew was himself a Merchant Navy navigator and first came to Plymouth to study in 1970. In those days crossing an ocean required the use of astro navigation and radars were relatively crude devices that needed a separate manual plotting process to establish whether there was a risk of collision with another vessel.
Teaching at the University now involves the use of a multi-ship simulation system which incorporates electronic charts, GPS and automated radar plotting aids. As with many other complex safety-critical operational scenarios, Marine Navigation has been transformed by the introduction of computer-based technologies.
Andrew's talk will highlight some of the key navigation systems which have changed in recent years and look to future developments. Most of Andrew's professional life between serving at sea and coming back to teach at the University has been spent working with systems that process weather information and deliver services for media and aviation. The integration of weather information with marine navigation systems is a particular area of interest and will be demonstrated in the talk.
Presentation notes in PDF format (5.5MB).

The State of Spyware: Protect Your Network from Evolving Spyware Trends
Colin Smith, Regional Account Manager, Europe, Webroot Software (13th November 2007)
Colin Smith will present current research on the evolution of spyware, reveal infection data from spyware audits, and explain current spyware trends, threats and propagation strategies. This session will also explain how spyware writers take advantage of security flaws and make users a vulnerable target and offer best practices to protect networks and systems from spyware attacks.
Presentation notes in PDF format (10MB)

The Future of Security
David Lacey (David Lacey Consulting Limited) (8th May 2007)
The business environment of the future will be very different from today’s. Boundaries between organisations and between personal and business computing will dissolve. Everyone and everything will be linked to the Internet. In order to survive these radical changes, organisations must embrace the uncertainty and the new risks this environment creates. David Lacey, formerly Chief Information Security Officer for leading organizations such as Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Royal Dutch/Shell Group and Royal Mail Group, will explain the emerging trends in IT Security and outline his own vision for how Business, IT and Security will evolve over the next fifteen years.
Presentation notes in PDF format (1MB)

From e-world to real world, the work of the CEOP centre
Maggie Brennan (Research Development and Strategy Advisor) and Mark Cameron (Digital Evidence Recovery Team), Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (26th April 2007)
The presentation opens with a description of the concept of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, its structure and current programmes of work, reviewing progress to date in each of the areas. The education programme, most wanted website, victim identification initiative, training programme, international strategy (G8 and VGT) will also be discussed. Finally the role and functions of research in the centre, key themes of research interest and the outreach strategy used to engage the research community are presented.
Presentation notes in PDF format (2MB)

Security Research at the University of Plymouth (13th March 2007)

Personal Privacy: I’ve got nothing to hide!
Mrs Shirley Atkinson, Network Research Group, University of Plymouth.
The explosion in the use of the Internet and the growth of the volume of available data has made collecting personal information about an individual easier than ever before. This exacerbates problems for vulnerable individual's that stem from the abuse of gathered information. Abuse and harm of individuals, through grooming, harassment and bullying, coexist with identity theft as examples of criminal behaviours, aggravated by the ready availability of personal information.
The Semantic Web is a proposed evolution of the Internet where data is made available in prescribed formats. Computers automatically gather, combine and reason providing a more context aware, more relevant experience for the end user. However, when considered in the context of an unobstructed exchange of personal data, there is potential to create privacy problems for vulnerable individuals.
This presentation introduces briefly the motivation for the research, some key findings and outlines how the Semantic Web is to be incorporated into a potential technological solution designed to benefit vulnerable groups, rather than compound their problems.
Presentation notes in PDF format (1MB)

Enhancing user authentication for mobile devices
Miss Sevasti Karatzouni, Network Research Group, University of Plymouth.
The evolution of mobile networks has brought a new range of services for mobile subscribers. In parallel with this, devices such as cellphones and PDAs are becoming more sophisticated tools; with data processing, storage and communication capabilities getting closer to the functionality of desktop computers. As such, the information that can be accessed and stored in such devices is becoming more and more sensitive. Current PIN-based authentication has proven to be an insufficient, inconvenient, and often unpopular approach. This research is seeking to devise to a more robust and flexible authentication mechanism for mobile handsets, which can provide security using a multi-level and multi-factor authentication approach. This presentation mainly focuses upon provide the findings from a focus group that took place as part of the early research, in order to assess the views and attitudes of mobile users towards the security of their devices.
Presentation notes in PDF format (2MB)

Intrusion Detection Systems: Facts, Challenges and Futures
Miss Gina Tjhai, Network Research Group, University of Plymouth.
Intrusion Detection System plays a vital role as a last defence against computer attacks. However, due to the sheer size and complexity of intrusions, along with the continuing growth of network computing, IDS technology is deemed to be far from perfect. As IT infrastructure becomes larger and more complicated, IDS systems tend to generate a large number of false alarms, which can overwhelm human operators. This talk will provide an introduction to the technology, its benefits, and the challenges faced by IDS systems. Relevant research in this area is addressing novel techniques to enhance IDS performance. Looking through the existing research of IDS system, which is then followed by the prospective approaches of new IDS technology, this will give us a brief overview on how a better IDS system could be developed, with a higher detection possibility and lower false alarm rate.
Presentation notes in PDF format (150KB)

Professionalism in IT - What it is and how we get it
Charles Hughes, former BCS President (20th February 2007)
The BCS is leading a major programme to create the ‘Profession of the 21st Century’
Exploiting the full potential of IT is now critical to both individual enterprises and national economies. Meeting that challenge demands much greater corporate and individual professionalism. It also requires an IT profession with stronger business competences, capable as acting not just as technical solution provider but also as business transformation partner. Charles will explain the importance of the BCS Professionalism in IT programme and how it will transform the industry.
Presentation notes in PDF format (1.7MB)

Peer-to-Peer Networks: Facts, Controversies and their Future
Dr Nikos Antonopoulos, University of Surrey (14th November 2006)
Peer-to-Peer networks have certainly generated plenty of controversy. On the one hand they have been hailed as the next evolutionary step of the Internet while they have also received significant criticism in terms of the nature of the applications they are being designed to support. Is this a technology we should be keeping an eye on and consider including in University Computing programmes or is it something we should dismiss as a platform for illegal file and content sharing? This talk will provide a gentle introduction to the technology, challenges and innovations P2P networks have brought into Computer Science in general and Distributed Systems in particular. Significant research over the past five years has started yielding numerous different P2P systems. Going through their principles of operation, popular myths and the scientific facts surrounding them we'll try to understand what the future holds for P2P computing and whether there is any potential for such systems to provide the basis for useful (and legal) high performance applications.
Presentation notes in PDF format (1.6MB)

Life, the World and Information Security in a Global Bank
James McKeogh, Information Risk Management, Barclays Wealth Management (10th October 2006)
Providing a consistent and appropriate level of security and risk control in an ever changing, re-strategising and permanently evolving institution can really take its toll. Finding the balance between pragmatic and SarbOx Compliant, is it more art or science? How can a Security Professional, really hope to add benefit while showing true ROI on what they are doing? Is it really possible to please all of the people some of the time? An insight into the real world problems and needs of an industry that likes to be ahead of the game without putting its neck out.
Presentation not yet available

Future Internet (and AGM)
Andy Press, Eclipse Internet (9th May 2006)
Details to follow
No presentation slides available.
AGM minutes available here.

Soft Buildings
Mike Phillips, iDAT, University of Plymouth (14th March 2006)
Buildings are solid, monolithic, static structures of steel, stone and glass. Buildings are at their most dynamic during the phases of construction and ossify from the point of completion. They occupy a different timescale to the rest of us, unlike the Mayfly that enacts its lifespan in the space of a day, or our three score and ten, buildings emerge from a long gestation to face the elements for periods that can span a thousand years. Or they used to - increasingly the contemporary built environment ebbs and flows, generating a dynamically changing landscape as buildings are designed, constructed and demolished in the time it used to take to construct a model. This state of flux is enhanced by the addition of surveillance systems, telematic communication networks and environmental monitoring and control technologies. All these factors provide a new tangible dimensionality to contemporary architecture.
Arch-OS is an 'Operating System' that harnesses these new architectural, technological and social dimensions. Arch-OS, 'software for buildings', has been developed to manifest the social, technological and environmental life of a building and provide a living laboratory for cultivating transdisciplinary knowledge. Arch-OS buildings will be permanently in a state of flux. By feeding on the diverse forms of dynamic data that are generated by a building, its environment and its occupants, Arch-OS transforms the architects drawings, the brick, steel, glass and fiber-optic infrastructure into a living breathing environment. Arch-OS provides users of buildings with a spatial and temporal consciousness, essentially re-programming human activity through a heightened social, architectural awareness. Arch-OS combines a rich mix of the physical and virtual into a new dynamic architecture, an 'intelligent' entity, that interacts, responds and anticipates: Arch-OS is a nervous system for multidimensional buildings.
'Soft Buildings' explores some of the 'dimensions' made manifest by Arch-OS. Specifically the generation of new kinds of social space, a new kind of model, generated by a soft building.
No presentation slides available.

Project Management for eBusiness
John Carroll, Carroll Consultants (17th January 2006)
This presentation set out the results of a study to establish which elements of project management methodology and processes are considered critical to the success of an eBusiness project. 26 projects were analysed by demographics, project size, criticality of processes and methodologies used. The data was further analysed to identify the processes and methodologies that had a correlation to project success. The presentation covered the 10 most critical and 5 most beneficial processes, the most popular and most successful methodologies and explored some other popular hypotheses.
Presentation notes in PDF format (97KB)

At the Crossroads of Evolutionary Computation and Music
Prof Eduardo Miranda, University of Plymouth (13th December 2005)
Evolutionary Computation (EC) may have varied applications in Music. This paper introduces three approaches to using EC in Music (namely, engineering, creative and musicological approaches) and discusses examples of representative systems that have been developed within the last decade, with emphasis on more recent and innovative works. We begin by reviewing engineering applications of EC in Music Technology such as Genetic Algorithms and Cellular Automata sound synthesis, followed by an introduction to applications where EC has been used to generate musical compositions. Next, we briefly introduce our ongoing research into EC models to study the evolution of music in surrogate worlds.
No presentation slides available.

Data/IP over Satellite Communications
Mr Des Prouse (NLGD5), Head of Technology & Service Development, BT Wholesale – Radio, Subsea & Satellite Communications (8th November 2005)
The aim of this presentation is to give an introduction to the technology and terms associated with computer networking via commercial satellite communications systems. A tutorial approach will be used to show how data transmission methods have evolved over 35 years in the satellite field from 2.4 Kbit/s voice-band-data to 155Mbit/s Internet backbone connectivity. Some current example services will be briefly described to show how designers cope with the issues of using the Internet Protocol (IP) over a geostationary satellite communications link.
Presentation notes in PDF format (2.54MB)

The Ten Commandments of Information Security Culture
Prof Rossouw von Solms, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa (11th October 2005)
Presentation notes in PDF format (544KB)

Software Asset Management: An Information Security Perspective
Prof Reinhardt Botha, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa (11th October 2005)
Presentation notes in PDF format (356KB)

BCS Project Evening 2005 (26th April)
Philip Symmonds, Project Management System (446KB),
Christos Makedonas, Dolce Musica Music School Website and Intranet Site System (2.6MB),
Tew Kar Leong, Generic Calculator Constructor (1.2MB),
Martin Wilson, Data Retrieval and Manipulation in a Retail Environment (155KB).

Attitudes to e-Government
Dr Andy Phippen, University of Plymouth (12th April 2005)
Presentation notes in pdf format (85 KB)

From Virtual Communities to Virtual Enterprises: A Business Perspective
Dr Brendan D'Cruz, Northampton Business School (12th April 2005)
Presentation notes in pdf format (169 KB)

Computer Forensics - Corporate Negligence
Dr Andy Jones, BT Security Research Centre (1st March 2005)
Presentation notes in pdf format (187 KB)

Who is to blame for IT Project failures?
Phil Davis (10th January 2005)
Presentation notes in pdf format (18 KB)

Responding to the threat
Graeme Pinkney, Symantec Managed Security Services (December 2004)
Presentation notes in pdf format (7.6 MB)

Bot Wars I: The attack of the parasitic clones
Jeremy Ward, Symantec (October 2004)
Presentation notes in pdf format (1.5 MB)

The Threat Landscape and Security Trends
Jeremy Ward, Symantec (July 2004)
Presentation notes in pdf format (2.3 MB)

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