IoT-Forensics Meets Privacy: Towards Cooperative Digital Investigations

Abstract

IoT-Forensics is a novel paradigm for the acquisition of electronic evidence whose operation is conditioned by the peculiarities of the Internet of Things (IoT) context. As a branch of computer forensics, this discipline respects the most basic forensic principles of preservation, traceability, documentation, and authorization. The digital witness approach also promotes such principles in the context of the IoT while allowing personal devices to cooperate in digital investigations by voluntarily providing electronic evidence to the authorities. However, this solution is highly dependent on the willingness of citizens to collaborate and they may be reluctant to do so if the sensitive information within their personal devices is not sufficiently protected when shared with the investigators. In this paper, we provide the digital witness approach with a methodology that enables citizens to share their data with some privacy guarantees. We apply the PRoFIT methodology, originally defined for IoT-Forensics environments, to the digital witness approach in order to unleash its full potential. Finally, we show the feasibility of a PRoFIT-compliant digital witness with two use cases.

Economics of Digital Ecosystems

“…The sustainability of a DES is based on the possibility of flexible changes to the structure of the ecosystem, the continuous interaction of members and their collaboration and cooperation [41]. The cooperation is considered by [42] in terms of the willingness of citizens to collaborate.…”

Federated Blockchain-Based Tracking and Liability Attribution Framework for Employees and Cyber-Physical Objects in a Smart Workplace

“…Several key facets were taken into consideration in constructing the framework, such as the Parkerian Hexad elements of information security [13], safety [14], computational efficiency, privacy and integrity of the digital evidence. For example, private permissioned BC technology does not permit unauthorised parties to manage digital evidence, therefore, one of the key advantages of this approach is to maintain a digital CoC without exposing any data to the public [42] aiming to preserve object's privacy as part of the digital investigation process [43]. The strengths of the public BC include freedom, neutrality and openness, whereas any participant can volunteer to send or validate a transaction, we assert that private BCs are a better choice for Smart Workplaces since all the participants are known and permissions are restricted, therefore the support for privacy is greater.…”

Proof of witness presence: Blockchain consensus for augmented democracy in smart cities

“…In addition, collaborative social challenges [38], [39] between citizens are means to introduce social proofs based on social psychology as well as community trust for protection against social engineering attacks [40]. Moreover, communities can also institutionalize their own digital witnesses based on privacy-preserving forensic techniques introduced in the context of blockchain [41], [42].…”