CS590B/690B - Measuring Network Interference Spring 2018

Instructor: Phillipa Gill
Time: M/W 9:05-10:20
Location: CS Rm. 142
Forum: Piazza

Description

This course will cover topics related to the broad issue of detecting network interference. This will include topics such as traffic differentiation, surveillance, and blocking of content. Tentative list of topics:

History of information controls
Ethical/legal issues around Internet censorship
Methods used for implementing Internet censorship around the globe
Tools and techniques for detecting censorship and traffic differentiation
Censorship of social media
Circumvention/anonymization technologies

The goal of this class is to leave you with the skills and knowledge needed to explain how different technical online information controls work as well as and understanding of the current landscape of research in this area. The course requirements are designed around meeting these goals through a variety of hands on activities, readings and evaluation.

Textbooks

There is no required textbook for the course. Readings will be posted with the associated lectures.

Prerequisites

The course will assume basic familiarity with networking protocols (e.g., TCP, HTTP). The material is appropriate for students that have previously taken the graduate networking course, or equivalent.

Grading

Your grade will be computed based on multiple components weight as follows for CS590B/690B. Totals add to 110% to allow for a potential of 10% bonus. You must pass both midterms to pass the course.

Component	CS590B	CS690B
Course Project	25%	25%
Midterm exams	10%+10%	10%+10%
Assignments	40%	40%
Paper Summaries	10%	10%
Paper Presentation	15%	15%

Course Project: You will work in a group of 2-3 students to complete a semester long project related to Internet censorship. This term your project task will be to repeat an existing study on Internet censorship. You should review papers from previous instances of the FOCI workshop, Internet Measurement Conference, USENIX Security, and other related conferences (or the course readings). Pick one of these papers to repeat for your project. You may consider older papers that bear revisiting. For your project you should carefully read the paper and figure out how you will repeat the study. Did they use public data sets that are collected on an ongoing basis? Did they use an infrastructure like PlanetLab where RIPE Atlas is a larger scale new alternative? You will compare the results of your repetition of the study with the original, taking into account changing censorship behaviors, any improvements you made to the methodology etc.

Midterm Exams: The course material is divided into two topic areas (1) measurement of censorship and online information controls and (2) circumvention and the censorship arms race. There will be two midterm exams in the course, each covering roughly 1/2 of the course material. The first midterm is Mar. 7, 2018 and the second midterm is [TBD].

Assignments: There will be 5 assignments to acquaint you with relevant measurement tools and techniques for a total of 40% of your final grade.

Paper Summaries: Each lecture has associated readings. You are required to write one (1) paper summary for each lecture (blog postings and Web links don't count). When there are multiple readings for a lecture, each student will be assigned one paper (if your student ID is odd, review the first paper, if your ID is even, please review the second paper). We will use the HotCRP review system (info coming soon!) to manage paper summaries and discussions. You will be asked to include a brief summary of the paper, it's strengths and weaknesses, ideas to improve it as well as detailed technical comments and then engage in technical discussion of the paper in the HotCRP system.

Paper Discussions. Prof. Gill will present a brief summary of each of the assigned papers in class. If there are multiple papers assigned for a class one of them will be chosen for a more in depth class discussion/debate. If your student ID%10 < 5 (ie., 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 mod 10) you will argue FOR the paper being discussed. If your student ID%10 >= 5 you will argue AGAINST the paper being discussed. We will dedicate 10-15 minutes at the end of class to debate the merits of the paper. You should think of this like a mock program committee meeting. By the end we will try to reach a consensus about the fate of the paper (accept, reject, accept if room).

Tentative Schedule

All information subject to change. **Readings in italics are optional** **Notes will be posted after lecture**

Date	Presenter	Notes	Topics	Readings
Part 1: Measuring Internet Censorship
Jan 22		L01	Introduction, History of Censorship	Historical reading
Jan 24		L02	Censorship Methods and Measurement Techniques	Country-Wide Outages Pakistan Hijack
Jan 29		L03	Censorship Methods and Measurement Techniques	NDSS2009 Ignoring
Jan 31		L04	Censorship Methods and Measurement Techniques	China's DNS Censorship Hold-On
Feb 5		L05	Censorship Methods and Measurement Techniques	Web trip-wires Here Be Proxies
Feb 7			Snow Day Class Cancelled
Feb 12		L06 Spooky Scan Brief Slides	Challenges of Measuring Internet Censorship	SpookyScan-extended Encore Burnett2013 Wright2011
Feb 14		L07	Measurement Frameworks/Platforms	Exploring Design Space ONI OONI Internet Censorship Lab Censmon Verkamp2012
Feb 19			Presidents Day Holiday No Class
Feb 21			Phillipa Traveling
Feb 26		L08	Net Neutrality / Traffic Differentiation	TrafficDifferentiation Measuring Congestion Glasnost MLab Interconnect Report
Feb 28			Class cancelled
Mar 5			Case Study: China + Iran	China Pam2011 GreatCannon ConceptDoppler ONI report Iran: Iran1 Iran2 Iran3 ONI report Psiphon report
Mar 7			Midterm 1
Mar 12			Spring Break
Mar 14			Spring Break
Mar 19		L11	Censorship of Online Social Networks	Social Spam Velocity China-Chats Project Weibo-COSN13 Twitter Spam
Mar 21		L12	Fingerprinting censorship products	Dalek Smartfilter blog post Planet Blue Coat
Part 2: Circumvention and the Censorship Arms Race
Mar 26			Guest Lecture by Ruxandra Paul of Amherst College
Mar 28		L13	Approaches to anonymity	Aqua Dissent Onion Routing Tor
Apr 2		L14	Attacks on Tor: Relay-based attacks and mitigation	CCS07, Website fingerprinting [Slides \| Paper]
Apr 4		L15	Attacks on Tor: Timing-Attacks (+ Internet routing review)	Oakland05 RAPTor
Apr 9		L16	Feasibility + mitigation of timing attacks	Users Get Routed Holding all the ASes Feamster and Dingledine LASTor
Apr 11		L17 L17-PartII	Covert Channels + Attacks on Covert Channels	FreeWave Castle SkypeMorph Parrot is Dead Cover your ACKs
Apr 16			Patriots Day -- No Class
Apr 17		L18	Decoy routing	* Note this is a Tuesday Tap Dance
Apr 18			Phillipa Traveling -- No Class
Apr 23		L19	Attack on Decoy Routing	Routing Around Decoys No Way Home
Apr 25			Final project presentations
Apr 30			Midterm 2

University policies and information

Academic Honesty Statement: Since the integrity of the academic enterprise of any institution of higher education requires honesty in scholarship and research, academic honesty is required of all students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Academic dishonesty is prohibited in all programs of the University. Academic dishonesty includes but is not limited to: cheating, fabrication, plagiarism, and facilitating dishonesty. Appropriate sanctions may be imposed on any student who has committed an act of academic dishonesty. Instructors should take reasonable steps to address academic misconduct. Any person who has reason to believe that a student has committed academic dishonesty should bring such information to the attention of the appropriate course instructor as soon as possible. Instances of academic dishonesty not related to a specific course should be brought to the attention of the appropriate department Head or Chair. Since students are expected to be familiar with this policy and the commonly accepted standards of academic integrity, ignorance of such standards is not normally sufficient evidence of lack of intent. Please read the UMass Academic Honesty Policy.

Other Academic Regulations: The Office of the Registrar publishes Academic Regulations yearly. You should be familiar with them. Particularly relevant are the policies on attendance, absences due to religious observance, and examinations.

Accommodation Statement: The University of Massachusetts Amherst is committed to providing an equal educational opportunity for all students. If you have a documented physical, psychological, or learning disability on file with Disability Services (DS), you may be eligible for reasonable academic accommodations to help you succeed in this course. If you have a documented disability that requires an accommodation, please notify me within the first two weeks of the semester so that we may make appropriate arrangements.