Security And Privacy Issues In Fog Computing

What is Fog Computing

One of the most emerging technologies in the field of information and communication technology is Fog Computing. After the development of online storage systems, several technologies were invented that were able to store large amounts of data in the online storage interface. Cloud computing and big data fall under this category [3]. While cloud computing provided the online storage interface, Big Data provided the online storage space for vast amounts of data. The online storage system is considered to be one of the best technical inventions and are used extensively by large commercial organizations all over the world. However, the problem arose when the data processing was not done efficiently by these technologies. Moreover, the data distribution in these storage spaces was not done accurately. Hence, there was a need for a new technology to solve these problems. Fog Computing solves this problem and provides data processing solutions for those using cloud computing services [7]. Fog computing system acts as an intermediate between the physical operational device and the cloud computing system. It processes the data from the users’ devices and then sends the processed data to respective storage spaces in the cloud.

In this research, fog computing is to be explored and its security and privacy issues are to be analyzed and addressed.

A. Problem Domain

Fog computing is closely related to Internet of Things as well as cloud computing as it benefits both of the services. Fog computing is used to process the personal information of the users that are sent to the cloud through internet of things. The main problem domain in this case is the security issue with the fog computing services. Since it handles a huge amount of personal data of the users, security threats can destroy the privacy of these data and information [12]. On the other hand, since fog computing is completely based online, there are a large number of cyber security threats that can do serious damage to all the data and information processed by the fog. Hence, the security and privacy issues with fog must be addressed in order make it more usable for the IoT users as well as the commercial organizations who use cloud computing services.

The main purpose of the research is to address the security and privacy issues in fog computing. The main threats of fog computing are cyber agents that deal with stealing or damaging of the personal information of common users. In this research, fog computing is to be explored in detail in order to identify its vulnerabilities and weak points that can be exploited by external cyber agents. Accordingly, suitable measures must be designed and deployed so that the threats from these external cyber agents can be minimized.

Fog Computing and Internet of Things

While some researchers might argue about why should the issues with fog have to be addressed while there are still sufficient rooms for newer and better technologies, the research on addressing the security and privacy issues of fog computing can be justified by the following reasons.

• Internet of Things is an extremely popular technology nowadays with its popularity increasing every day. In order to manage all the data used by Internet of Things, fog computing is a necessary technology to process all the data.
• With the increasing popularity of Internet of Things, data traffic is increasing significantly. In order to manage all the data and reduce the traffic, fog computing is extremely necessary.
• Due to the data traffic, the network bandwidth changes frequently to catch all types of data from different sources. Fog computing can be used to solve this issue and maintain a standard network bandwidth while also capturing all the data.
• Fog computing also aids the improvement of system response time.

Before conducting any research, a list of research questions is to be prepared. These research questions are to be addressed during the course of the project. The research questions for this project are as follows.

1. What is fog computing and what are its advantages?
2. What types of data are processed through fog computing?
3. What are the vulnerabilities of fog computing?
4. What are the main security and privacy threats of fog computing?
5. How can the security and privacy issues of fog computing be addressed?

Fog computing is a software based data processing and management system similar to cloud computing. Cloud is a virtual interface for handling and management of information inside a virtual storage interface that will generally require physical capacity framework. With expanding utilization of Internet of Things, the information administration and capacity by cloud have essentially lessened in proficiency and precision. Subsequently, the new fog framework will be created with a specific end goal to lessen the movement in the cloud and increment precision and productivity of information administration and capacity [10]. Because of extensive variety of advantages of fog, numerous new technical developments have been constantly developed for benefiting the cloud, IoT and big data. Besides, fog can be utilized to handle numbers issues and inaccuracies provided by cloud and IoT. For the research of fog computing services, the available technical setup has to be upgraded so that it supports different software processing of cloud and fog computing services.

A. Research and System Development Model

For the purpose of this research, standard research process will be followed. The research will be conducted in two stages – review of existing literature and evaluation of practical applications of the system. The context of the research questions is be analyzed using the existing literatures that contain works of reputed researchers on advanced information technology and online storage system. From the literature survey, sufficient amount of primary data can be collected that can be used to analyze the fog computing system and its vulnerabilities. In the next stage, practical implementation of fog computing will be done and analyzed. In this project stage, fog computing will be installed in the system and analyzed on the basis of collected primary data. Moreover, secondary data will be collected from the experimental results.

For the purpose of system development, at first, the available technical setup will be upgraded so that it can support cloud and fog operations. After that, a subscription will be done in a cloud server in which, the implementation of fog computing will be done. After the implementation is complete, the security and privacy issues of fog will be analyzed and addressed.

Security and Privacy Issues in Fog Computing

Data will be collected from two sources – primary data will be obtained from the review of literature and secondary data will be obtained from experimental results. After the experiment is complete, the two types of data will be compared for parity and the final test results will be published accordingly. It is to be ensured that the final data is sufficient to address the security and privacy issues of fog computing.

In different research activities, several ethical issues are associated especially in this research, where the project involves handling users’ personal information through fog computing. Moreover, there are certain ethical guidelines of software usage by the local government. Hence, while conducting the research, it is to be ensured that the privacy of the user information is maintained and the ethical guidelines of software usage is followed while implementing and operating fog computing system.

The use of softwares in the project must comply with the usage guidelines of the government as well as the manufacturers of the software. Copyright infringement is strictly banned and the softwares and online services used in the project must be done after the companies’ permission or full subscription in the services.

Data analysis will be done using the comparison results of the primary and secondary data. Initially, while performing the literature analysis, the primary data analysis will be done while during the experiment, the secondary data analysis will be conducted. During the final phase of the research, both types of data will be compared and analyzed for generating the final results.

A. Research Deliverables

The final deliverables of the research are as follows.

• An in-depth analysis of fog computing service and its benefits
• Analysis of vulnerabilities in fog computing system
• Analysis of the security and privacy issues in fog computing
• Final document containing the plans for addressing the security and privacy issues of fog computing

The main objective of the research is to identify and address the threats associated with fog computing system. Hence, there are a lot of risks and threats that are needed to be addressed in course of the research. The first main risk associated with fog computing is the privacy risk. Fog computing deals with processing of a huge amount of personal information of the users and as a result, the privacy has to be maintained at all costs [6]. Cyber security threats like hackers and malwares seek this type of personal information of the common users and use it for unethical activities like masked transactions, fraud cases and others. This is exactly the main reason why many users still do not rely on fog computing. If this issue can be addressed and minimized, it will raise the potential of fog computing and the business organizations will extensively use fog computing services. Another main risk associated with this is the network security. Fog computing is completely based online, wireless network security is a significant risk. Wireless network security issues include sniffer attacks, jamming attacks and others [4]. Finally, another major risk in the fog system is the rogue fog node. Sometimes, some unethical hackers prepare and attach rogue fog nodes to a fog system. These rogue fog nodes can act as regular fog node and once the user provides personal information, the rogue fog node captures it and sends it to the parent rogue server. In this way, huge amounts of personal information of users have been lost through the fog computing system.

Task Name	Duration	Start	Finish
Fog Computing Security Development Research Project	95 days	Mon 27-03-17	Fri 04-08-17
Project Planning Phase	12 days	Mon 27-03-17	Tue 11-04-17
Preparation of Research Plan	5 days	Mon 27-03-17	Fri 31-03-17
Analysis of the Research Plan	5 days	Mon 03-04-17	Fri 07-04-17
Scheduling of Research Period and Resource Requirements	2 days	Mon 10-04-17	Tue 11-04-17
Project Initiation Phase	3 days	Mon 10-04-17	Wed 12-04-17
Verification of Project Plan against Research Requirements	1 day	Mon 10-04-17	Mon 10-04-17
Approval of Research Plan	1 day	Tue 11-04-17	Tue 11-04-17
Initiation of the Research	1 day	Wed 12-04-17	Wed 12-04-17
Project Execution Phase	59 days	Wed 12-04-17	Mon 03-07-17
Survey of Existing Literature	20 days	Thu 13-04-17	Wed 10-05-17
Primary Data Collection	3 days	Thu 11-05-17	Mon 15-05-17
Primary Data Analysis	5 days	Tue 16-05-17	Mon 22-05-17
Application of Technical Upgrades	15 days	Wed 12-04-17	Tue 02-05-17
System Planning and Development	15 days	Wed 03-05-17	Tue 23-05-17
Implementation of Proposed System Model	10 days	Wed 24-05-17	Tue 06-06-17
Subscription of Cloud Storage Server	4 days	Wed 07-06-17	Mon 12-06-17
Implementation of Fog Server	3 days	Tue 13-06-17	Thu 15-06-17
Secondary Data Collection	5 days	Tue 13-06-17	Mon 19-06-17
Secondary Data Analysis	10 days	Tue 20-06-17	Mon 03-07-17
Project Closing Phase	36 days	Fri 16-06-17	Fri 04-08-17
Comparison of Primary and Secondary Data	10 days	Tue 20-06-17	Mon 03-07-17
Development of System Usage Protocol	5 days	Tue 04-07-17	Mon 10-07-17
Implementation of Fog Privacy and Security System	10 days	Fri 16-06-17	Thu 29-06-17
Final Analysis and Testing	5 days	Fri 30-06-17	Thu 06-07-17
Analysis of Further Risks and Issues	5 days	Fri 07-07-17	Thu 13-07-17
Mitigation of Risks and Debugging	5 days	Fri 14-07-17	Thu 20-07-17
Completion of Research and Documentation	10 days	Fri 21-07-17	Thu 03-08-17
Researchers Signoff	1 day	Fri 04-08-17	Fri 04-08-17

V. Conclusion

In this research, fog computing is to be explored and its security and privacy issues are to be analyzed and addressed. One of the most emerging technologies in the field of information and communication technology is Fog Computing. After the development of online storage systems, several technologies were invented that were able to store large amounts of data in the online storage interface. Cloud computing and big data fall under this category. While cloud computing provided the online storage interface, Big Data provided the online storage space for vast amounts of data. The online storage system is considered to be one of the best technical inventions and are used extensively by large commercial organizations all over the world. There are a lot of risks and threats that are needed to be addressed in course of the research. The first main risk associated with fog computing is the privacy risk. Fog computing deals with processing of a huge amount of personal information of the users and as a result, the privacy has to be maintained at all costs. Cyber security threats like hackers and malwares seek this type of personal information of the common users and use it for unethical activities like masked transactions, fraud cases and others. In this research, all the associated privacy and security issues of fog computing will be addressed.

VI. References

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