scholarly journals The potential harms of the Tor anonymity network cluster disproportionately in free countries

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (50) ◽  
pp. 31716-31721
Author(s):  
Eric Jardine ◽  
Andrew M. Lindner ◽  
Gareth Owenson
Keyword(s):  
Child Abuse ◽  
Illicit Drugs ◽  
Network Cluster ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
Anonymity Network ◽  
Tor Network ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Services Use

The Tor anonymity network allows users to protect their privacy and circumvent censorship restrictions but also shields those distributing child abuse content, selling or buying illicit drugs, or sharing malware online. Using data collected from Tor entry nodes, we provide an estimation of the proportion of Tor network users that likely employ the network in putatively good or bad ways. Overall, on an average country/day, ∼6.7% of Tor network users connect to Onion/Hidden Services that are disproportionately used for illicit purposes. We also show that the likely balance of beneficial and malicious use of Tor is unevenly spread globally and systematically varies based upon a country’s political conditions. In particular, using Freedom House’s coding and terminological classifications, the proportion of often illicit Onion/Hidden Services use is more prevalent (∼7.8%) in “free” countries than in either “partially free” (∼6.7%) or “not free” regimes (∼4.8%).

The Joint Contribution of Experiencing and Witnessing Violence During Childhood on Child Abuse in the Parent Role

2003 ◽  
Vol 18 (6) ◽  
pp. 619-639 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan M. Cunningham
Keyword(s):  
Child Abuse ◽  
Family Violence ◽  
Family Income ◽  
Control Variable ◽  
Childhood Experiences ◽  
Witnessing Violence ◽  
Survey Results ◽  
Childhood Violence ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Joint Contribution

This article examines adult respondents’ abuse of children as a consequence of their own childhood experiences of abuse, both direct experiences of childhood violence (hitting) and exposure to interparental violence (witnessing). In particular, the study examines the extent to which these factors function interactively: Are both experience and exposure necessary or is either sufficient to increase disproportionately the probability of child abuse? Using data from the Second National Family Violence Survey, results of a logistic regression analysis show that either or both factors produced higher than average and relatively similar rates of child abuse. Only respondents with neither form of family violence reported lower than average rates of abuse of their own children. The analysis controlled for gender, race, family income, and family structure; race was the only control variable to be significantly associated with child abuse. Finally, no control variable modified the interaction between the family violence variables.

scholarly journals A Structural Model of the Retail Market for Illicit Drugs

2017 ◽  
Vol 107 (3) ◽  
pp. 858-896 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manolis Galenianos ◽  
Alessandro Gavazza
Keyword(s):  
Illicit Drugs ◽  
Structural Model ◽  
Crack Cocaine ◽  
Retail Market ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Using Data ◽  
First Time ◽  
Relative Profitability

We estimate a model of illicit drugs markets using data on purchases of crack cocaine. Buyers are searching for high-quality drugs, but they determine drugs' quality (i.e., their purity) only after consuming them. Hence, sellers can rip off first-time buyers or can offer higher-quality drugs to induce buyers to purchase from them again. In equilibrium, a distribution of qualities persists. The estimated model implies that if drugs were legalized, in which case purity could be regulated and hence observable, the average purity of drugs would increase by approximately 20 percent and the dispersion would decrease by approximately 80 percent. Moreover, increasing penalties may raise the purity and affordability of the drugs traded by increasing sellers' relative profitability of targeting loyal buyers versus first-time buyers. (JEL D12, K42, L15, L65)

scholarly journals Provider Cultural Competency, Client Satisfaction, and Engagement in Home-Based Programs to Treat Child Abuse and Neglect

2011 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy Damashek ◽  
David Bard ◽  
Debra Hecht
Keyword(s):  
Child Abuse ◽  
Cultural Competence ◽  
Goal Attainment ◽  
Client Satisfaction ◽  
Child Abuse And Neglect ◽  
Home Based ◽  
Abuse And Neglect ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Family Preservation Program

Home-based programs to treat child abuse and neglect suffer from high rates of attrition, limiting their impact. Thus, research is needed to identify factors related to client engagement. Using data ( N = 1,305) from a statewide family preservation program, this study investigated the role of program type (i.e., SafeCare® [SC] vs. Services as Usual [SAU]) and client perceived provider cultural competence on client satisfaction and engagement with services. Families in SC completed more treatment goals than those in SAU. In addition, provider cultural competence and client satisfaction were higher in SC than in SAU. Higher provider cultural competence was associated with higher goal attainment and satisfaction, and these effects partially mediated the service program differences. The effects of service type and cultural competence on goal attainment and satisfaction varied somewhat by client ethnicity. Findings suggest that clients receiving manualized programs for child maltreatment may be more likely to meet their goals and may perceive such programs to be culturally appropriate and satisfactory.

scholarly journals Control Combating Corruption: A Governance Model from Indonesians' Perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Muktiyanto ◽  
Rini Dwiyani ◽  
Noorina Hartati ◽  
Halim Dedy Perdana ◽  
Bayu Taufiq Possumah
Keyword(s):  
Agency Theory ◽  
Good Governance ◽  
Data Governance ◽  
Transparency International ◽  
Governance Model ◽  
The World ◽  
Corruption Perception ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Inference Tests

The purpose of this study is to propose an appropriate governance model to deal with corruption. This study reveals the indicators, from where and how corruption will be resisted. By using data governance and corruption control as well as the corruption perception index from WGI and TII in 2008-2018, this study proposed a quantitative approach to strengthen the results of the inference tests of the effect of good governance on the potential for corruption, confirming and expanding on work carried out with critical informants by Transparency International Indonesia (TII). The study found that, from the perspective of agency theory, the influence of governance on corruption has been proved, both in the context of the world and Indonesia. Good governance will make the trustee (agent) not arbitrarily follow their wishes through corruption to enrich themselves or other parties, but instead follow the mandate given by the principal (community). This study also shows, in the world context, that by adherence to ethical rules being followed by effective government, in stable political conditions, and public voices being heard, corruption can be eradicated. In the context of Indonesia, to suppress criminal acts of corruption, stable political conditions and guarantees for public votes must be done first, then effective government and compliance with regulations can follow.

scholarly journals Critical Traffic Analysis on the Tor Network

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Florian Platzer ◽  
Marcel Schäfer ◽  
Martin Steinebach
Keyword(s):  
Traffic Analysis ◽  
Prominent Feature ◽  
Service Architecture ◽  
Popular Method ◽  
Data Packets ◽  
Web Contents ◽  
Anonymity Network ◽  
Tor Network ◽  
Critical Traffic

Tor is a widely-used anonymity network with more than two million daily users. A prominent feature of Tor is the hidden service architecture. Hidden services are a popular method for communicating anonymously or sharing web contents anonymously. For security reasons, in Tor all data packets to be send over the network are structured completely identical. They are encrypted using the TLS protocol and its size is fixed to exactly 512 bytes. In this work we describe a method to deanonymize any hidden service on Tor based on traffic analysis. This method allows an attacker with modest resources to deanonymize any hidden services in less than 12.5 days. This poses a threat to anonymity online.

scholarly journals Data-plane Defenses against Routing Attacks on Tor

2016 ◽  
Vol 2016 (4) ◽  
pp. 276-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry Tan ◽  
Micah Sherr ◽  
Wenchao Zhou
Keyword(s):  
Defense Mechanisms ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Statistical Techniques ◽  
Control Plane ◽  
Routing Attacks ◽  
Internet Service ◽  
Data Plane ◽  
Anonymity Network ◽  
Tor Network ◽  
Correlation Attacks

Abstract Tor is susceptible to traffic correlation attacks in which an adversary who observes flows entering and leaving the anonymity network can apply statistical techniques to correlate flows and de-anonymize their endpoints. While an adversary may not be naturally positioned to conduct such attacks, a recent study shows that the Internet’s control-plane can be manipulated to increase an adversary’s view of the network, and consequently, improve its ability to perform traffic correlation. This paper explores, in-depth, the effects of control-plane attacks on the security of the Tor network. Using accurate models of the live Tor network, we quantify Tor’s susceptibility to these attacks by measuring the fraction of the Tor network that is vulnerable and the advantage to the adversary of performing the attacks. We further propose defense mechanisms that protect Tor users from manipulations at the control-plane. Perhaps surprisingly, we show that by leveraging existing trust anchors in Tor, defenses deployed only in the data-plane are sufficient to detect most control-plane attacks. Our defenses do not assume the active participation of Internet Service Providers, and require only very small changes to Tor. We show that our defenses result in a more than tenfold decrease in the effectiveness of certain control-plane attacks.

Automated Identification of Child Abuse in Chat Rooms by Using Data Mining

2016 ◽  
pp. 245-274
Author(s):  
Mohammadreza Keyvanpour ◽  
Mohammadreza Ebrahimi ◽  
Necmiye Genc Nayebi ◽  
Olga Ormandjieva ◽  
Ching Y. Suen
Keyword(s):  
Data Mining ◽  
Child Abuse ◽  
Online Social Networks ◽  
Chat Rooms ◽  
Automated Identification ◽  
Safe Environment ◽  
Cyber Space ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Major Factors ◽  
Scalable Data Mining

Providing a safe environment for juveniles and children in online social networks is considered as one of the major factors of improving public safety. Due to the prevalence of the online conversations, mitigating the undesirable effects of child abuse in cyber space has become inevitable. Using automatic ways to combat this kind of crime is challenging and demands efficient and scalable data mining techniques. The problem can be casted as a combination of textual preprocessing in data/text mining and pattern classification in machine learning. This chapter covers different data mining methods including preprocessing, feature extraction and the popular ways of feature enrichment through extracting sentiments and emotional features. A brief tutorial on classification algorithms in the domain of automated predator identification is also presented through the chapter. Finally, the discussion is summarized and the challenges and open issues in this application domain are discussed.

scholarly journals Comparative Effectiveness of Famotidine in Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Azza Shoaibi ◽  
Stephen Fortin ◽  
Rachel Weinstein ◽  
Jesse Berlin ◽  
Patrick Ryan
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Source Population ◽  
Health Records ◽  
Intention To Treat ◽  
Risk Of Death ◽  
Hazard Ratios ◽  
History Of ◽  
Study Population ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Services Use

Background: Famotidine has been posited as a potential treatment for COVID-19. We compared the incidence of COVID-19 outcomes (i.e., death; and death or intensive services use) among hospitalized famotidine users vs. proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) users, hydroxychloroquine users or famotidine non-users separately. Methods: We constructed a retrospective cohort study using data from COVID-19 Premier Hospital electronic health records. Study population were COVID-19 hospitalized patients aged 18 years or older. Famotidine, PPI and hydroxychloroquine exposure groups were defined as patients dispensed any medication containing one of the three drugs on the day of admission. The famotidine non-user group was derived from the same source population with no history of exposure to any drug with famotidine as an active ingredient prior to or on the day of admission. Time-at-risk was defined based on the intention-to-treat principle starting 1 day after admission to 30 days after admission. For each study comparison group, we fit a propensity score (PS) model through large-scale regularized logistic regression. The outcome was modeled using a survival model. Results: We identified 2193 users of PPI, 5950 users of the hydroxychloroquine, 1816 users of famotidine and 26,820 non-famotidine users. After PS stratification, the hazard ratios for death were as follows: famotidine vs no famotidine HR 1.03 (0.89-1.18); vs PPIs: HR 1.14 (0.94-1.39); vs hydroxychloroquine:1.03 (0.85-1.24). Similar results were observed for the risk of death or intensive services use. Conclusion: We found no evidence of a reduced risk of COVID-19 outcomes among hospitalized COVID-19 patients who used famotidine compared to those who did not or compared to PPI or hydroxychloroquine users.

When to Risk It? Institutions, Ambitions, and the Decision to Run for the U.S. House

2006 ◽  
Vol 100 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
CHERIE D. MAESTAS ◽  
SARAH FULTON ◽  
L. SANDY MAISEL ◽  
WALTER J. STONE
Keyword(s):  
State Legislators ◽  
Institutional Characteristics ◽  
Stage Model ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
Political Ambition ◽  
Second Stage ◽  
Democratic System ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
Progressive Ambition ◽  
Using Data

The health of any democratic system depends on political ambition to generate a steady supply of quality candidates for office. Because most models of candidate entry assume ambition rather than model it, previous research fails to understand its roots in individual and institutional characteristics. We develop a two-stage model of progressive behavior that distinguishes between the formation of ambition for higher office and the decision to enter a particular race. Using data from a survey of state legislators, we demonstrate that the intrinsic costs and benefits associated with running for and holding higher office shape ambitions but do not influence the decision to run. For progressively ambitious legislators, the second-stage decision is a strategic choice aboutwhento run rather thanwhetherto run. Our research highlights how institutional characteristics that foster progressive ambition also increase the likelihood that national or local political conditions will be translated into meaningful choices at the ballot box.

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