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Abstract—Signature-based Intrusion Detection Systems (SIDSs) are traditionally used to detect malicious activity in networks. A notable example of such a system is Snort, which compares network traffic against a series of rules that match known exploits. Current SIDS rules are designed to minimize the amount of legitimate traffic flagged incorrectly, reducing the burden on network administrators. However, different use cases than the traditional one–such as researchers studying trends or analyzing modified versions of known exploits–may require SIDSs to be less constrained in their operation. In this paper, we demonstrate that applying modifications to real-world SIDS rules allow for relaxing some constraints and characterizing the performance space of modified rules. We develop an iterative approach for exploring the space of modifications to SIDS rules. By taking the modifications that expand the ROC curve of performance and altering them further, we show how to modify rules in a directed manner. Using traffic collected and identified as benign or malicious from a cloud telescope, we find that the removal of a single component from SIDS rules has the largest impact on the performance space. Effectively modifying SIDS rules to reduce constraints can enable a broader range of detection for various objectives, from increased security to research purposes. 

Abstract Millions of consumers depend on smart camera systems to remotely monitor their homes and businesses. However, the architecture and design of popular commercial systems require users to relinquish control of their data to untrusted third parties, such as service providers (e.g., the cloud). Third parties therefore can (and in some instances have) access the video footage without the users’ knowledge or consent—violating the core tenet of user privacy. In this paper, we present CaCTUs , a privacy-preserving smart Camera system Controlled Totally by Users. CaCTUs returns control to the user ; the root of trust begins with the user and is maintained through a series of cryptographic protocols, designed to support popular features, such as sharing, deleting, and viewing videos live. We show that the system can support live streaming with a latency of 2 s at a frame rate of 10 fps and a resolution of 480 p. In so doing, we demonstrate that it is feasible to implement a performant smart-camera system that leverages the convenience of a cloud-based model while retaining the ability to control access to (private) data.