V.S. Subrahmanian - Böcker

Multimedia Information Systems brings together in one place important contributions and up-to-date research results in this fast moving area. Multimedia Information Systems serves as an excellent reference, providing insight into some of the most challenging research issues in the field.

Multimedia Information Systems brings together in one place important contributions and up-to-date research results in this fast moving area. Multimedia Information Systems serves as an excellent reference, providing insight into some of the most challenging research issues in the field.

Imagine yourself as a military officer in a conflict zone trying to identify locations of weapons caches supporting road-side bomb attacks on your country’s troops. Or imagine yourself as a public health expert trying to identify the location of contaminated water that is causing diarrheal diseases in a local population. Geospatial abduction is a new technique introduced by the authors that allows such problems to be solved. Geospatial Abduction provides the mathematics underlying geospatial abduction and the algorithms to solve them in practice; it has wide applicability and can be used by practitioners and researchers in many different fields. Real-world applications of geospatial abduction to military problems are included. Compelling examples drawn from other domains as diverse as criminology, epidemiology and archaeology are covered as well. This book also includes access to a dedicated website on geospatial abduction hosted by University of Maryland. Geospatial Abduction targets practitioners working in general AI, game theory, linear programming, data mining, machine learning, and more. Those working in the fields of computer science, mathematics, geoinformation, geological and biological science will also find this book valuable.

Computational Analysis of Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba provides an in-depth look at Web intelligence, and how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology can influence the insights we have on terrorist groups. This book primarily focuses  on one famous terrorist group known as Lashkar-e-Taiba (or LeT), and  how it operates. After 10 years of counter Al Qaeda operations,  LeT is considered by many in the counter-terrorism community to be an even greater threat to the US and world peace than Al Qaeda. Computational Analysis of  Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba is the first book that demonstrates how to use modern computational analysis techniques including methods for “big data” analysis.  This book presents how to quantify both the environment in which LeT operate, and  the actions it took over a 20-year period, and represent it as a relational database table. This table is then mined using sophisticated data mining algorithms in order to gain detailed, mathematical, computational and statistical insights into LeT and its operations. This book also provides a detailed  history of  Lashkar-e-Taiba based on extensive analysis conducted by  using open source information and public statements. Each chapter includes a case study, as well as  a slide describing the key results which are available on the authors’ web sites.Computational Analysis of  Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba is designed for a professional market composed of  government or military workers, researchers  and computer scientists working in the web intelligence field. Advanced-level students in computer science will also find this valuable as a reference book.

Terrorist groups throughout the world have been studied primarily through the use of social science methods. However, major advances in IT during the past decade have led to significant new ways of studying terrorist groups, making forecasts, learning models of their behaviour, and shaping policies about their behaviour. Handbook of Computational Approaches to Counterterrorism provides the first in-depth look at how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology is shaping the study of terrorist groups. This book includes contributions from world experts in the field, and presents extensive information on terrorism data sets, new ways of building such data sets in real-time using text analytics, introduces the mathematics and computational approaches to understand terror group behaviour, analyzes terror networks, forecasts terror group behaviour, and shapes policies against terrorist groups. Auxiliary information will be posted on the book’s website. Thisbook targets defence analysts, counter terror analysts, computer scientists, mathematicians, political scientists, psychologists, and researchers from the wide variety of fields engaged in counter-terrorism research. Advanced-level students in computer science, mathematics and social sciences will also find this book useful.

Our cyber defenses are static and are governed by lengthy processes, e.g., for testing and security patch deployment.  Adversaries could plan their attacks carefully over time and launch attacks at cyber speeds at any given moment.  We need a new class of defensive strategies that would force adversaries to continually engage in reconnaissance and re-planning of their cyber operations.  One such strategy is to present adversaries with a moving target where the attack surface of a system keeps changing. Moving Target Defense II: Application of Game Theory and Adversarial Modeling includes contributions from world experts in the cyber security field.  In the first volume of MTD, we presented MTD approaches based on software transformations, and MTD approaches based on network and software stack configurations. In this second volume of MTD, a group of leading researchers describe game theoretic, cyber maneuver, and software transformation approaches for constructing and analyzing MTD systems. Designed as a professional book for practitioners and researchers working in the cyber security field, advanced -level students and researchers focused on computer science will also find this book valuable as a secondary text book or reference.

This SpringerBrief proposes a general framework for reasoning about inconsistency in a wide variety of logics, including inconsistency resolution methods that have not yet been studied.  The proposed framework allows users to specify preferences on how to resolve inconsistency when there are multiple ways to do so. This empowers users to resolve inconsistency in data leveraging both their detailed knowledge of the data as well as their application needs. The brief shows that the framework is well-suited to handle inconsistency in several logics, and provides algorithms to compute preferred options. Finally, the brief shows that the framework not only captures several existing works, but also supports reasoning about inconsistency in several logics for which no such methods exist today.

Search games and rendezvous problems have received growing attention in computer science within the past few years.  Rendezvous problems emerge naturally, for instance, to optimize performance and convergence of mobile robots. This gives a new algorithmic point of view to the theory. Furthermore, modern topics such as the spreading of gossip or disease in social networks have lead to new challenging problems in search and rendezvous. Search Theory: A Game Theoretic Perspective introduces the first integrated approach to Search and Rendezvous from the perspectives of  biologists, computer scientists and mathematicians. This contributed volume covers a wide range of topics including rendezvous problems and solutions, rendezvous on graphs, search games on biology, mobility in governed social networks, search and security, and more.  Most chapters also include case studies or a  survey, in addition to a chapter on the future direction of Search and Rendezvous research. This book targets researchers and practitioners working in computer science, mathematics and biology as a reference book.  Advanced level students focused on these fields will also find this book valuable as a secondary text book or reference.

Terrorist groups throughout the world have been studied primarily through the use of social science methods. However, major advances in IT during the past decade have led to significant new ways of studying terrorist groups, making forecasts, learning models of their behaviour, and shaping policies about their behaviour. Handbook of Computational Approaches to Counterterrorism provides the first in-depth look at how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology is shaping the study of terrorist groups. This book includes contributions from world experts in the field, and presents extensive information on terrorism data sets, new ways of building such data sets in real-time using text analytics, introduces the mathematics and computational approaches to understand terror group behaviour, analyzes terror networks, forecasts terror group behaviour, and shapes policies against terrorist groups. Auxiliary information will be posted on the book’s website. Thisbook targets defence analysts, counter terror analysts, computer scientists, mathematicians, political scientists, psychologists, and researchers from the wide variety of fields engaged in counter-terrorism research. Advanced-level students in computer science, mathematics and social sciences will also find this book useful.

Computational Analysis of Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba provides an in-depth look at Web intelligence, and how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology can influence the insights we have on terrorist groups. This book primarily focuses  on one famous terrorist group known as Lashkar-e-Taiba (or LeT), and  how it operates. After 10 years of counter Al Qaeda operations,  LeT is considered by many in the counter-terrorism community to be an even greater threat to the US and world peace than Al Qaeda. Computational Analysis of  Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba is the first book that demonstrates how to use modern computational analysis techniques including methods for “big data” analysis.  This book presents how to quantify both the environment in which LeT operate, and  the actions it took over a 20-year period, and represent it as a relational database table. This table is then mined using sophisticated data mining algorithms in order to gain detailed, mathematical, computational and statistical insights into LeT and its operations. This book also provides a detailed  history of  Lashkar-e-Taiba based on extensive analysis conducted by  using open source information and public statements. Each chapter includes a case study, as well as  a slide describing the key results which are available on the authors’ web sites.Computational Analysis of  Terrorist Groups: Lashkar-e-Taiba is designed for a professional market composed of  government or military workers, researchers  and computer scientists working in the web intelligence field. Advanced-level students in computer science will also find this valuable as a reference book.

Our cyber defenses are static and are governed by lengthy processes, e.g., for testing and security patch deployment.  Adversaries could plan their attacks carefully over time and launch attacks at cyber speeds at any given moment.  We need a new class of defensive strategies that would force adversaries to continually engage in reconnaissance and re-planning of their cyber operations.  One such strategy is to present adversaries with a moving target where the attack surface of a system keeps changing. Moving Target Defense II: Application of Game Theory and Adversarial Modeling includes contributions from world experts in the cyber security field.  In the first volume of MTD, we presented MTD approaches based on software transformations, and MTD approaches based on network and software stack configurations. In this second volume of MTD, a group of leading researchers describe game theoretic, cyber maneuver, and software transformation approaches for constructing and analyzing MTD systems. Designed as a professional book for practitioners and researchers working in the cyber security field, advanced -level students and researchers focused on computer science will also find this book valuable as a secondary text book or reference.

Imagine yourself as a military officer in a conflict zone trying to identify locations of weapons caches supporting road-side bomb attacks on your country’s troops. Or imagine yourself as a public health expert trying to identify the location of contaminated water that is causing diarrheal diseases in a local population. Geospatial abduction is a new technique introduced by the authors that allows such problems to be solved. Geospatial Abduction provides the mathematics underlying geospatial abduction and the algorithms to solve them in practice; it has wide applicability and can be used by practitioners and researchers in many different fields. Real-world applications of geospatial abduction to military problems are included. Compelling examples drawn from other domains as diverse as criminology, epidemiology and archaeology are covered as well. This book also includes access to a dedicated website on geospatial abduction hosted by University of Maryland. Geospatial Abduction targets practitioners working in general AI, game theory, linear programming, data mining, machine learning, and more. Those working in the fields of computer science, mathematics, geoinformation, geological and biological science will also find this book valuable.

Search games and rendezvous problems have received growing attention in computer science within the past few years.  Rendezvous problems emerge naturally, for instance, to optimize performance and convergence of mobile robots. This gives a new algorithmic point of view to the theory. Furthermore, modern topics such as the spreading of gossip or disease in social networks have lead to new challenging problems in search and rendezvous. Search Theory: A Game Theoretic Perspective introduces the first integrated approach to Search and Rendezvous from the perspectives of  biologists, computer scientists and mathematicians. This contributed volume covers a wide range of topics including rendezvous problems and solutions, rendezvous on graphs, search games on biology, mobility in governed social networks, search and security, and more.  Most chapters also include case studies or a  survey, in addition to a chapter on the future direction of Search and Rendezvous research. This book targets researchers and practitioners working in computer science, mathematics and biology as a reference book.  Advanced level students focused on these fields will also find this book valuable as a secondary text book or reference.

This Springer Brief presents a basic algorithm that provides a correct solution to finding an optimal state change attempt, as well as an enhanced algorithm that is built on top of the well-known trie data structure. It explores correctness and algorithmic complexity results for both algorithms and experiments comparing their performance on both real-world and synthetic data. Topics addressed include optimal state change attempts, state change effectiveness, different kind of effect estimators, planning under uncertainty and experimental evaluation. These topics will help researchers analyze tabular data, even if the data contains states (of the world) and events (taken by an agent) whose effects are not well understood. Event DBs are omnipresent in the social sciences and may include diverse scenarios from political events and the state of a country to education-related actions and their effects on a school system. With a wide range of applications in computer science and the social sciences, the information in this Springer Brief is valuable for professionals and researchers dealing with tabular data, artificial intelligence and data mining. The applications are also useful for advanced-level students of computer science.

This book explores fundamental scientific problems essential for autonomous cyber defense. Specific areas include:Game and control theory-based moving target defenses (MTDs) and adaptive cyber defenses (ACDs) for fully autonomous cyber operations;The extent to which autonomous cyber systems can be designed and operated in a framework that is significantly different from the human-based systems we now operate;On-line learning algorithms, including deep recurrent networks and reinforcement learning, for the kinds of situation awareness and decisions that autonomous cyber systems will require;Human understanding and control of highly distributed autonomous cyber defenses;Quantitative performance metrics for the above so that autonomous cyber defensive agents can reason about the situation and appropriate responses as well as allowing humans to assess and improve the autonomous system.This book establishes scientific foundations for adaptive autonomous cyber systems and ultimately brings about a more secure and reliable Internet. The recent advances in adaptive cyber defense (ACD) have developed a range of new ACD techniques and methodologies for reasoning in an adaptive environment.Autonomy in physical and cyber systems promises to revolutionize cyber operations. The ability of autonomous systems to execute at scales, scopes, and tempos exceeding those of humans and human-controlled systems will introduce entirely new types of cyber defense strategies and tactics, especially in highly contested physical and cyber environments. The development and automation of cyber strategies that are responsive to autonomous adversaries pose basic new technical challenges for cyber-security.This book targets cyber-security professionals and researchers (industry, governments, and military). Advanced-level students in computer science and information systems will also find this book useful as a secondary textbook.

This book explores fundamental scientific problems essential for autonomous cyber defense. Specific areas include:Game and control theory-based moving target defenses (MTDs) and adaptive cyber defenses (ACDs) for fully autonomous cyber operations;The extent to which autonomous cyber systems can be designed and operated in a framework that is significantly different from the human-based systems we now operate;On-line learning algorithms, including deep recurrent networks and reinforcement learning, for the kinds of situation awareness and decisions that autonomous cyber systems will require;Human understanding and control of highly distributed autonomous cyber defenses;Quantitative performance metrics for the above so that autonomous cyber defensive agents can reason about the situation and appropriate responses as well as allowing humans to assess and improve the autonomous system.This book establishes scientific foundations for adaptive autonomous cyber systems and ultimately brings about a more secure and reliable Internet. The recent advances in adaptive cyber defense (ACD) have developed a range of new ACD techniques and methodologies for reasoning in an adaptive environment.Autonomy in physical and cyber systems promises to revolutionize cyber operations. The ability of autonomous systems to execute at scales, scopes, and tempos exceeding those of humans and human-controlled systems will introduce entirely new types of cyber defense strategies and tactics, especially in highly contested physical and cyber environments. The development and automation of cyber strategies that are responsive to autonomous adversaries pose basic new technical challenges for cyber-security.This book targets cyber-security professionals and researchers (industry, governments, and military). Advanced-level students in computer science and information systems will also find this book useful as a secondary textbook.

One of the most influential actors in spreading Islamist violence across the Sahel is Jama’at Nasr Al Islam Wal Muslimin (JNIM).This book provides the first systematic quantitative analysis of JNIM’s behavior by analyzing a 12-year database of JNIM’s attacks and the environment surrounding JNIM. This book leverages AI/ML predictive models to accurately predict almost 40 types of attacks using over 80 independent variables. This book describes a set of temporal probabilistic rules that state that when the environment in which the group operates satisfies some conditions, then an attack of a certain type will likely occur in the next N months.  This provides a deep, easy to comprehend understanding of the conditions under which JNIM carries various kinds of attacks up to 6 months into the future. This book will serve as an invaluable guide to scholars (computer scientists, political scientists, policy makers). Military officers, intelligence personnel, and government employees, who seek to understand, predict, and eventually mitigate attacks by JNIM and bring peace to the nations of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger will want to purchase this book as well.

Advance Praise for Indian Mujahideen: Computational Analysis and Public Policy “This book presents a highly innovative computational approach to analyzing the strategic behavior of terrorist groups and formulating counter-terrorism policies. It would be very useful for international security analysts and policymakers.” Uzi Arad, National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister of Israel and Head, Israel National Security Council (2009-2011) “An important book on a complex security problem. Issues have been analysed in depth based on quality research. Insightful and well-balanced in describing the way forward.” Naresh Chandra, Indian Ambassador to the USA (1996-2001) and Cabinet Secretary (1990-1992). “An objective and clinical account of the origins, aims, extra-territorial links and modus-operandi, of a growingly dangerous terrorist organization that challenges the federal, democratic, secular and pluralistic ethos of India’s polity. The authors have meticulously researched and analysed the multi-faceted challenges that the “Indian Mujahideen” poses and realistically dwelt on the ways in which these challenges could be faced and overcome.” G. Parthasarathy, High Commissioner of India to Australia (1995-1998) and Pakistan (1998-2000). This book provides the first in-depth look at how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology can influence insights on analysis and policies directed at the Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorist group. The book also summarizes how the IM group is committed to the destabilization of India by leveraging links with other terror groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, and through support from the Pakistani Government and Pakistan’s intelligence service.Foreword by The Hon. Louis J. Freeh.

This book features a wide spectrum of the latest computer science research relating to cyber warfare, including military and policy dimensions. Cyber Warfare: Building the Scientific Foundation targets researchers and practitioners working in cyber security, especially government employees or contractors.

This is the first book  that uses cyber-vulnerability data to explore the vulnerability of over four million machines per year, covering a two-year period as reported by Symantec. Analyzing more than 20 billion telemetry reports comprising malware and binary reputation reports, this book quantifies the cyber-vulnerability of 44 countries for which at least 500 hosts were monitored. Chapters explain the context for this data and its impact, along with explaining how the cyber-vulnerability is calculated. This book also contains a detailed summary of the cyber-vulnerability of dozens of nations according to the percentage of infected hosts and number of infections. It identifies relationships between piracy rates, GDP and other country indicators. The book contains detailed information about potential cyber-security policies that 44 countries have announced, as well as an analysis of gaps in cyber-security policies in general.The Global Cyber-Vulnerability Report targets researchers and  professionals including government and military workers, policy-makers and law-makers  working in cybersecurity or the web intelligence fields. Advanced-level students in computer science will also find this report valuable as a reference.

This edited volume features a wide spectrum of the latest computer science research relating to cyber deception. Specifically, it features work from the areas of artificial intelligence, game theory, programming languages, graph theory, and more. The work presented in this book highlights the complex and multi-facted aspects of cyber deception, identifies the new scientific problems that will emerge in the domain as a result of the complexity, and presents novel approaches to these problems.This book can be used as a text for a graduate-level survey/seminar course on cutting-edge computer science research relating to cyber-security, or as a supplemental text for a regular graduate-level course on cyber-security.

This book features a wide spectrum of the latest computer science research relating to cyber warfare, including military and policy dimensions. It is the first book to explore the scientific foundation of cyber warfare and features research from the areas of artificial intelligence, game theory, programming languages, graph theory and more. The high-level approach and emphasis on scientific rigor provides insights on ways to improve cyber warfare defense worldwide. Cyber Warfare: Building the Scientific Foundation targets researchers and practitioners working in cyber security, especially government employees or contractors. Advanced-level students in computer science and electrical engineering with an interest in security will also find this content valuable as a secondary textbook or reference.

Advance Praise for Indian Mujahideen: Computational Analysis and Public Policy “This book presents a highly innovative computational approach to analyzing the strategic behavior of terrorist groups and formulating counter-terrorism policies. It would be very useful for international security analysts and policymakers.” Uzi Arad, National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister of Israel and Head, Israel National Security Council (2009-2011) “An important book on a complex security problem. Issues have been analysed in depth based on quality research. Insightful and well-balanced in describing the way forward.” Naresh Chandra, Indian Ambassador to the USA (1996-2001) and Cabinet Secretary (1990-1992). “An objective and clinical account of the origins, aims, extra-territorial links and modus-operandi, of a growingly dangerous terrorist organization that challenges the federal, democratic, secular and pluralistic ethos of India’s polity. The authors have meticulously researched and analysed the multi-faceted challenges that the “Indian Mujahideen” poses and realistically dwelt on the ways in which these challenges could be faced and overcome.” G. Parthasarathy, High Commissioner of India to Australia (1995-1998) and Pakistan (1998-2000). This book provides the first in-depth look at how advanced mathematics and modern computing technology can influence insights on analysis and policies directed at the Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorist group. The book also summarizes how the IM group is committed to the destabilization of India by leveraging links with other terror groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, and through support from the Pakistani Government and Pakistan’s intelligence service.Foreword by The Hon. Louis J. Freeh.

This is the first book that uses cyber-vulnerability data to explore the vulnerability of over four million machines per year, covering a two-year period as reported by Symantec.

This edited volume features a wide spectrum of the latest computer science research relating to cyber deception. Specifically, it features work from the areas of artificial intelligence, game theory, programming languages, graph theory, and more. The work presented in this book highlights the complex and multi-facted aspects of cyber deception, identifies the new scientific problems that will emerge in the domain as a result of the complexity, and presents novel approaches to these problems.This book can be used as a text for a graduate-level survey/seminar course on cutting-edge computer science research relating to cyber-security, or as a supplemental text for a regular graduate-level course on cyber-security.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the First International Conference on Scalable Uncertainty Management, SUM 2007, held in Washington, DC, USA, in October 2007. The 20 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions for inclusion in the book. The papers address artificial intelligence researchers, database researchers and practitioners.