SmartGlacis: Security and privacy technologies for smart cities
| University | Universitat Oberta de Catalunya |
|---|---|
| Centre/Departament/Research Group | Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3) KISON Research Group |
| Research title | SmartGlacis: Security and privacy technologies for smart cities |
| Scientific area | Smart Cities, Information Society |
| Related Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) | SDG 9: Build resilient infrastructure, promote sustainable industrialization and foster innovation SDG 11: Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable SDG 16: Promover sociedades pacíficas e inclusivas para el desarrollo sostenible, facilitar el acceso a la justicia para todos y construir a todos los niveles instituciones eficaces e inclusivas que rindan cuentas |
| Target(s) to which it contributes | 9.1. Develop quality, reliable, sustainable and resilient infrastructure, including regional and transborder infrastructure, to support economic development and human well-being, with a focus on affordable and equitable access for all. 9.2. Promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and, by 2030, significantly raise industry’s share of employment and gross domestic product, in line with national circumstances, and double its share in least developed countries. 9.5. Enhance scientific research, upgrade the technological capabilities of industrial sectors in all countries, in particular developing countries, including, by 2030, encouraging innovation and substantially increasing the number of research and development workers per 1 million people and public and private research and development spending. 11.3. By 2030, enhance inclusive and sustainable urbanization and capacity for participatory, integrated and sustainable human settlement planning and management in all countries. 16.7. Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels. 16.10. Ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation and international agreements. |
| Further information | https://www.uoc.edu/portal/en/in3/recerca/grups/kriptography_and_information |
The specific objectives of this project are the following:
- To develop protocols for privacy-preserving citizen participation. Specifically, we will focus on e-voting and e-polling, emergency response and management of user-generated content. Such protocols must allow (i) the participation of citizens in decision-making by means of electronic voting and polling, (ii) the communication of emergency reports to an emergency authority in order to guarantee a prompt attention of this kind of situations, and (iii) the distribution of user-generated content using On-line Social Networks created within the smart city platform. All these protocols will involve sensitive data of the users (such as location) and must provide privacy guarantees. These protocols must also offer anonymity that can be revoked in case of user misbehavior. Responsible PI: David Megías.
- To demonstrate our privacy-preserving green mobility, e-commerce and citizen participation protocols on the City OS smart city platform [City14] in whose design UOC participates. To this end, the data coming from the protocols designed under WP1, WP2 and 9 de 25 / parte C MEMORIA CIENTÍFICO-TÉCNICA DE PROYECTOS COORDINADOS WP3 should be integrated into the City OS information and event management (SIEM) system. Additionally, our contribution should ensure a safe use of the City OS data sources with regard to citizen privacy. Responsible PI: Helena Rifà.
- To research and/or adapt cryptographic techniques to support and underpin the protocols proposed in this project. On the one hand, to find the most appropriate homomorphic encryption schemes according to the operations needed on encrypted data in the cloud. On the other hand, to research the cryptographic primitives that can be used to preserve the privacy of the users. The techniques that will be explored are secure multiparty computation protocols to compute functions that depend on private or confidential information, and encryption/signing techniques that provide a certain amount of anonymity (e.g. partially blind signatures, group signatures, identity-based signatures, and bitcoins). Responsible PIs: David Megías and Josep Domingo-Ferrer.
The scientific contributions will have a clear social impact, as they will help configuring smart cities as spaces where humans will lead more comfortable and free lives. Without technologies such as the proposed ones, smart cities (and the information society in general) are likely to become more and more similar to giant panopticons, where every move by every citizen is recorded and associated to his/her profile.
