A novel autonomous container-based platform for cybersecurity training and research.

Cyberattacks, particularly those targeting systems that store or handle sensitive data, have become more sophisticated in recent years. To face increasing threats, continuous capacity building and digital skill competence are needed. Cybersecurity hands-on training is essential to upskill cybersecurity professionals. However, the cost of developing and maintaining a cyber range platform is high. Setting up an ideal digital environment for cybersecurity exercises can be challenging and often need to invest a lot of time and system resources in this process. In this article, we present a lightweight cyber range platform that was developed under the open-source cloud platform OpenStack, based on Docker technology using IaC methodology. Combining the advantages of Docker technology, DevOps automation capabilities, and the cloud platform, the proposed cyber range platform achieves the maximization of performance and scalability while reducing costs and resources.

Sensors Cybersecurity.

At present, sensors are increasingly used in all kinds of platforms, manned or unmanned, particularly in view of the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) [...].

Enhancing shopping experiences in smart retailing.

The retailing market has undergone a paradigm-shift in the last decades, departing from its traditional form of shopping in brick-and-mortar stores towards online shopping and the establishment of shopping malls. As a result, "small" independent retailers operating in urban environments have suffered a substantial reduction of their turnover. This situation could be presumably reversed if retailers were to establish business "alliances" targeting economies of scale and engage themselves in providing innovative digital services. The SMARTBUY ecosystem realizes the concept of a "distributed shopping mall", which allows retailers to join forces and unite in a large commercial coalition that generates added value for both retailers and customers. Along this line, the SMARTBUY ecosystem offers several novel features: (i) inventory management of centralized products and services, (ii) geo-located marketing of products and services, (iii) location-based search for products offered by neighboring retailers, and (iv) personalized recommendations for purchasing products derived by an innovative recommendation system. SMARTBUY materializes a blended retailing paradigm which combines the benefits of online shopping with the attractiveness of traditional shopping in brick-and-mortar stores. This article provides an overview of the main architectural components and functional aspects of the SMARTBUY ecosystem. Then, it reports the main findings derived from a 12 months-long pilot execution of SMARTBUY across four European cities and discusses the key technology acceptance factors when deploying alike business alliances.

Hands-On Experiences in Deploying Cost-Effective Ambient-Assisted Living Systems.

Older adults' preferences to remain independent in their own homes along with the high costs of nursing home care have motivated the development of Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) technologies which aim at improving the safety, health conditions and wellness of the elderly. This paper reports hands-on experiences in designing, implementing and operating UbiCare, an AAL based prototype system for elderly home care monitoring. The monitoring is based on the recording of environmental parameters like temperature and light intensity as well as micro-level incidents which allows one to infer daily activities like moving, sitting, sleeping, usage of electrical appliances and plumbing components. The prototype is built upon inexpensive, off-the-shelf hardware (e.g., various sensors, Arduino microcontrollers, ZigBee-compatible wireless communication modules) and license-free software, thereby ensuring low system deployment costs. The network comprises nodes placed in a house's main rooms or mounted on furniture, one wearable node, one actuator node and a centralized processing element (coordinator). Upon detecting significant deviations from the ordinary activity patterns of individuals and/or sudden falls, the system issues automated alarms which may be forwarded to authorized caregivers via a variety of communication channels. Furthermore, measured environmental parameters and activity incidents may be monitored through standard web interfaces.

Secure dissemination of electronic healthcare records in distributed wireless environments.

A new networking paradigm has emerged with the appearance of wireless computing. Among else ad-hoc networks, mobile and ubiquitous environments can boost the performance of systems in which they get applied. Among else, medical environments are a convenient example of their applicability. With the utilisation of wireless infrastructures, medical data may be accessible to healthcare practitioners, enabling continuous access to medical data. Due to the critical nature of medical information, the design and implementation of these infrastructures demands special treatment in order to meet specific requirements; among else, special care should be taken in order to manage interoperability, security, and in order to deal with bandwidth and hardware resource constraints that characterize the wireless topology. In this paper we present an architecture that attempts to deal with these issues; moreover, in order to prove the validity of our approach we have also evaluated the performance of our platform through simulation in different operating scenarios.