Jurgen Harms

Flexible Internet Secure Transactions Based on Collaborative Domains

The absence of manageable global key distribution schemes is seriously hindering the deployment of basic security services in the Internet. The emergence of cryptosystems based on public key technology has represented a significant improvement in this direction by removing the need of a mutual agreement on the encryption key. However, the certificate structures that bind a user to his public key are difficult to deploy especially in inter-domain environments. As a consequence, although the need for security services like encryption or authentication is becoming crucial, most Internet transactions currently take place without the use of any of these services. This paper proposes a novel approach for simplifying key manageability relying on the notion of security domains. The fundamental idea relies on the fact that key management and thus security services are easier to achieve inside a well confined domain. Consequently, large scale security might be seen as a combination of intra-domain security and a secure framework for transactions between domains. In other words, user keys are managed internally and only domain keys need to be handled globally. We present the cryptographic schemes needed to achieve confidentiality and authentication based on the collaboration of security domains.

Toward Automatic, Run-Time Fault Management for Component-Based Applications

Although components are well tested and intrinsically more reliable than custom-made software, applications built of components generally lack global verification (especially if they are independently extensible) and are subject to distributed failure scenarios. We discuss a simple component framework based on a data flow architecture that addresses these problems and allows for building failure-resilient applications. We illustrate the characteristics that make this architecture particularly suitable for automatic fault management and explain the mechanisms we use for detecting, diagnosing and correcting faults at run-time.

Mobile agent-based shared registry system for electronic commerce of Internet domain names

Internet domain name management is currently developing into a very significant market. We present the design and implementation of the domain name exchange (DNX) platform, the primary purpose of which is to support an integrated market for domain names. Our platform is based on mobile agent technology, which enables flexible and efficient electronic trade of domain names. Our registration model is the shared registry system model aiming at an open and fair registration process. We propose with DNX to enhance the basic registration service by a set of value-added services, such as intelligent registration, cross-top level domain registration and active event notification. Our platform implementation is based on a secured-Java mobile agent platform that provides the basic tools for programming the DNX system. Furthermore, the DNX platform makes possible the co-existence of an electronic domain name trading system with other electronic commerce components, such as conflict and dispute resolution systems.

Using interfaces to specify access rights

Mobile agents are usually expected to execute in open environments. This openness implies that they should be able to dynamically learn how to interact with other agents and services which were not known at development time. The interlocutors therefore have to publish enough information about their functionality, while at the same time they have to restrict access rights in order to preserve their integrity. We describe in this paper a messenger-based framework which proposes run-time generated interfaces to address this duality.

Domain Name eXchange: a mobile-agent-based shared registry system

DNX is a platform-independent system designed to extend Cores proposed Shared Registry System for managing domain names. DNX aims to provide several value-added services to the market, including intelligent registration.

A Multi-level Interface Structure for the Selective Publication of Services in an Open Environment

Mobile agents are usually expected to execute in open environments, and this makes them particularly vulnerable to directed attacks. In this paper, we are interested in the aspects of security related to the initiation and maintainance of secure interaction between mobile agents from different origins meeting or residing in the same computational environment on a given host.