text:
- Research
- Open Access
Quantization in zero leakage helper data schemes
© de Groot et al. 2016
- Received: 22 October 2015
- Accepted: 20 April 2016
- Published: 5 May 2016
A helper data scheme (HDS) is a cryptographic primitive that extracts a high-entropy noise-free string from noisy data. Helper data schemes are used for preserving privacy in biometric databases and for physical unclonable functions. HDSs are known for the guided quantization of continuous-valued sources as well as for repairing errors in discrete-valued (digitized) sources. We refine the theory of helper data schemes with the zero leakage (ZL) property, i.e., the mutual information between the helper data and the extracted secret is zero. We focus on quantization and prove that ZL necessitates particular properties of the helper data generating function: (1) the existence of "sibling points", enrollment values that lead to the same helper data but different secrets and (2) quantile helper data.
We present an optimal reconstruction algorithm for our ZL scheme, that not only minimizes the reconstruction error rate but also yields a very efficient implementation of the verification. We compare the error rate to schemes that do not have the ZL property.
- Biometrics
- Fuzzy extractor
- Helper data
- Privacy
- Secrecy leakage
- Secure sketch
1 Introduction
1.1 Biometric authentication: the noise problem
Biometrics have become a popular solution for authentication or identification, mainly because of their convenience. A biometric feature cannot be forgotten (like a password) or lost (like a token). Nowadays identity documents such as passports nearly always include biometric features extracted from fingerprints, faces, or irises. Governments store biometric data for forensic investigations. Some laptops and smart phones authenticate users by means of biometrics.
Strictly speaking, biometrics are not secret. In fact, fingerprints can be found on many objects. It is hard to prevent one's face or iris from being photographed. However, storing biometric features in an unprotected, open database. Introduces both security and privacy risks. Security risks include the production of fake biometrics from the stored data, e.g., rubber fingers [1, 2]. These fake biometrics can be used to obtain unauthorized access to services, to gain confidential information or to leave fake evidence at crime scenes. We also mention two privacy risks. (1) Some biometrics are known to reveal diseases and disorders of the user. (2) Unprotected storage allows for cross-matching between databases.
These security and privacy problems cannot be solved by simply encrypting the database. It would not prevent insider attacks, i.e., attacks or misuse by people who are authorized to access the database. As they legally possess the decryption keys, database encryption does not stop them.
The problem of storing biometrics is very similar to the problem of storing passwords. The standard solution is to store hashed passwords. Cryptographic hash functions are one-way functions, i.e., inverting them to calculate a secret password from a public hash value is computationally infeasible. Even inside attackers who have access to all the hashed passwords cannot deduce the user passwords from them.
Straightforward application of this hashing method to biometrics does not work for biometrics, however. Biometric measurements are noisy, which causes (small) differences between the digital representation of the enrollment measurement and the digitized measurement during verification. Particularly if the biometric value lies near a quantization boundary, a small amount of noise can flip the discretized value and trigger an avalanche of bit flips at the output of the hash.
1.2 Helper data schemes
The solution to the noise problem is to use a helper data scheme (HDS) [3, 4]. A HDS consists of two algorithms, Gen and Rep. In the enrollment phase, the Gen algorithm takes a noisy (biometric) value as input and generates not only a secret but also public data called helper data. The Rep algorithm is used in the verification phase. It has two inputs: the helper data and a fresh noisy (biometric) value obtained from the same source. The Rep algorithm outputs an estimator for the secret that was generated by Gen.
The helper data makes it possible to derive the (discrete) secret reproducibly from noisy measurements, i.e., to perform error correction, while not revealing too much information about the enrollment measurement. The noise-resistant secret can be hashed as in the password protection scheme.
1.3 A two-stage approach
We describe a commonly adopted two-stage approach for real-valued sources, as for instance presented in ([5], Chap. 16). The main idea is as follows. A first-stage HDS performs quantization (discretization) of the real-valued input. Helper data is applied in the "analog" domain, i.e., before quantization. Typically, the helper data consists of a 'pointer' to the center of a quantization interval. The quantization intervals can be chosen at will, which allows for optimizations of various sorts [6–8].
After the first stage, there is typically still some noise in the quantized output. A second-stage HDS employs digital error correction techniques, for instance the code offset method (also known as Fuzzy Commitment) [3, 9] or a variant thereof [10, 11].
Such a two-stage approach is also common practice in communication systems that suffer from unreliable (wireless) channels: the signal conditioning prior to the quantization involves optimization of signal constellations and multidimensional transforms. The discrete mathematical operations, such as error correction decoding, are known to be effective only for sufficiently error-free signals. According to the asymptotic Elias bound ([12], Chap. 17), at bit error probabilities above 10 % one cannot achieve code rates better than 0.5. Similarly, in biometric authentication, optimization of the first stage appears essential to achieve adequate system performance. The design of the first stage is the prime motivation, and key contribution, of this paper.
At enrollment, a person's biometric x̲ is obtained. The transform is applied, yielding features \((x_{i})_{i=1}^{M}\). The Gen algorithm of the first-stage HDS is applied to each feature independently. This gives continuous helper data \((w_{i})_{i=1}^{M}\) and short secret strings s 1,…,s M which may or may not have equal length, depending on the signal-to-noise ratio of the features. All these secrets are combined into one high-entropy secret k, e.g., by concatenating them after Gray-coding. Biometric features are subject to noise, which will lead to some errors in the reproduced secret \(\hat {k}\); hence, a second stage of error correction is done with another HDS. The output of the second-stage Gen algorithm is discrete helper data r and a practically noiseless string c. The hash h(c∥z) is stored in the enrollment database, along with the helper data \((w_{i})_{i=1}^{M}\) and r. Here,z is salt, a random string to prevent easy cross-matching.
In the authentication phase, a fresh biometric measurement y̲ is obtained and split into components \((y_{i})_{i=1}^{M}\). For each i independently, the estimator \(\hat {s}_{i}\) is computed from y i and w i . The \(\hat s_{i}\) are combined into an estimator \(\hat {k}\), which is then input into the 2nd-stage HDS reconstruction together with r. The result is an estimator \(\hat {c}\). Finally, \(h(\hat {c}\|z)\) is compared with the stored hash h(c∥z).
1.4 Fuzzy extractors and secure sketches
Fuzzy extractor
The probability distribution of s given w has to be (nearly) uniform.
Secure sketch
s given w must have high entropy, but does not have to be uniform. Typically, s is equal to (a discretized version of) x.
The FE is typically used for the extraction of cryptographic keys from noisy sources such as physical unclonable functions (PUFs) [14–16]. Some fixed quantization schemes support the use of a fuzzy extractor, provided that the quantization intervals can be chosen such that each secret s is equiprobable, as in [17].
The SS is very well suited to the biometrics scenario described above.
1.5 Security and privacy
In the HDS context, the main privacy question is how much information, and which information, about the biometric x̲ is leaked by the helper data. Ideally, the helper data would contain just enough information to enable the error correction. Roughly speaking, this means that the vector \({\underbar {w}=(w_{i})_{i=1}^{M}}\) consists of the noisy "least significant bits" of x̲, which typically do not reveal sensitive information since they are noisy anyway. In order to make this kind of intuitive statement more precise, one studies the information-theoretic properties of HDSs. In the system as sketched in Fig. 1, the mutual information1 I(C;W̲,R) is of particular interest: it measures the leakage about the string c caused by the fact that the attacker observes w̲ and r. By properly separating the "most significant digits" of x̲ from the "least significant digits", it is possible to achieve I(C;W̲,R)=0. We call this zero secrecy leakage or, more compactly, zero leakage (ZL).2 HDSs with the ZL property are very interesting for quantifying privacy guarantees: if a privacy-sensitive piece of a biometric is fully contained in c, and not in (w̲,r), then a ZL HDS based database reveals absolutely nothing about that piece.3
We will focus in particular on schemes whose first stage has the ZL property for each feature separately: I(S i ;W i )=0. If the transform in Fig. 1 yields independent features, then automatically I(S j ;W i )=0 for all i,j, and the whole first stage has the ZL property.
1.6 Contributions and organization of this paper
We show that the ZL constraint for continuous helper data necessitates the existence of "Sibling Points", points x that correspond to different s but give rise to the same helper data w.
We prove that the ZL constraint for \(x\in \mathbb R\) implies "quantile" helper data. This holds for uniformly distributed s as well as for non-uniform s. Thus, we identify a simple quantile construction as being the generic ZL scheme for all HDS types, including the FE and SS as special cases. It turns out that the continuum limit of a FE scheme of Verbitskiy et al. [7] precisely corresponds to our quantile HDS.
We derive a reconstruction algorithm for the quantile ZL FE that minimizes the reconstruction errors. It amounts to using a set of optimized threshold values, and is very suitable for low-footprint implementation.
We analyze, in an all-Gaussian example, the performance (in terms of reconstruction error rate) of our ZL FE combined with the optimal reconstruction algorithm. We compare this scheme to fixed quantization and a likelihood-based classifier. It turns out that our error rate is better than that of fixed quantization, and not much worse than that of the likelihood-based classifier.
The organization of this paper is as follows. Section 2 discusses quantization techniques. After some preliminaries (Section 3), the sibling points and the quantile helper data are treated in Section 4. Section 5 discusses the optimal reconstruction thresholds. The performance analysis in the Gaussian model is presented in Section 6.
2 Related work on biometric quantization
2.1 Fixed quantization (FQ)
The simplest form of quantization applies a uniform, fixed quantization grid during both enrollment and verification. An example for N=4 quantization regions is depicted in Fig. 2a. An unfavorably located genuine user pdf, near a quantization boundary, can cause a high reconstruction error.
The inherently large error probability can be mitigated by "reliable component" selection [17]. Only components x i far away from a boundary are selected; the rest are discarded. The indices of the reliable components constitute the helper data. Such a scheme is very inefficient, as it wastes resources: features that are unfavorably located w.r.t. the quantization grid, but nonetheless carry information, are eliminated. Furthermore, the helper data leaks information about the biometric, since the intervals have unequal width and therefore unequal probabilities of producing reliable components [19].
2.2 Quantization index modulation (QIM)
QIM borrows principles from digital watermarking [20] and writing on dirty paper [21]. QIM has quantization intervals alternatingly labeled with 's'0" and "1" as the values for the secret s. The helper data w is constructed as the distance from x to the middle of a quantization interval; adding w to y then offsets the pdf so that the pdf is centered on the interval (Fig. 2b), yielding a significantly lower reconstruction error probability than FQ.
The freedom to choose quantization step sizes allows for a trade-off between reconstruction performance and leakage [4]. The alternating labeling was adopted to reduce leakage but sacrifices a large part of the source's entropy.
2.3 Likelihood-based quantization (LQ)
At enrollment, the LQ scheme [6] allocates N quantization regions as follows. The first two boundaries are chosen such that they yield the same probability of y given x, and at the same time enclose a probability mass 1/N on the background distribution (the whole population's distribution). Subsequent quantization intervals are chosen contiguous to the first and again enclose a 1/N probability mass. Finally, the probability mass in the tails of the background distribution is added up as a wrap-around interval, which also holds a probability mass of 1/N. Since the quantization boundaries are at fixed probability mass intervals, it suffices to communicate a single boundary t as helper data to the verification phase.
In LQ, the secret s is not equiprobable. The error rates are low, but the revealed t leaks information about s.
2.4 Dynamic detection-rate-based bit allocation
In [22], Lim et al. proposed dynamic genuine interval search (DGIS) as an improvement of the bit allocation scheme of Chen et al. [23]. The resulting scheme has some similarity to our approach in that they both determine discretization intervals per user and store these intervals as helper data. However, their scheme is motivated solely by optimization of the detection rate, whereas in our scheme the optimization is subject to the zero leakage restriction. Applying the DGIS method introduces some additional leakage to the underlying bit allocation scheme. Furthermore, DGIS performs its search for the optimal discretization intervals using a sliding window algorithm, which in general will not succeed in finding the exact optimum. In contrast, in our scheme, we analytically derive the optimal solution from the background distribution.
3 Preliminaries
3.1 Notation
Random variables are denoted with capital letters and their realizations in lowercase. The notation \({\mathbb {E}}\) stands for expectation. Sets are written in calligraphic font. We zoom in on the one-dimensional first-stage HDS in Fig. 1. For brevity of notation the index i∈{1,…,M} on x i ,w i ,s i ,y i and \(\hat {s}_{i}\) will be omitted.
3.2 Zero leakage
We will work with a definition of the zeroleakage property that is a bit stricter than the usual formulation [7], which pertains to mutual information. This is necessary in order to avoid problems caused by the fact that W is a continuum variable (e.g., pathological cases where some property does not hold on measure-zero subsets of \(\mathcal {W}\)),
Definition 3.1.
In words, we define the ZL property as independence between S and W. Knowledge about W has no effect on the adversary's uncertainty about S. ZL implies I(S;W)=0 or, equivalently, H(S|W)=H(S). Here H stands for Shannon entropy, and I for mutual information (see, e.g., ([24], Eq. (2.35)–(2.39)).
3.3 Noise model
It is common to assume a noise model in which the enrollment measurement x and verification measurement y are both derived from a hidden 'true' biometric value z, i.e., X=Z+N e and Y=Z+N v, where N e stands for the noise in the enrollment measurement and N v for the noise in the verification measurement. It is assumed that N e and N v are mutually independent and independent of X and Y. The N e,N v have zero mean and variance \(\sigma _{\mathrm {e}}^{2},\sigma _{\mathrm {v}}^{2}\) respectively. The variance of z is denoted as \({\sigma _{Z}^{2}}\). This is a very generic model. It allows for various special cases such as noiseless enrollment, equal noise at enrollment, and verification, etc.
It is readily seen that the variance of X and Y is given by \({\sigma _{X}^{2}}={\sigma _{Z}^{2}}+\sigma _{\mathrm {e}}^{2}\) and \({\sigma _{Y}^{2}}={\sigma _{Z}^{2}}+\sigma _{\mathrm {v}}^{2}\). The correlation coefficient ρ between X and Y is defined as \(\rho =({\mathbb {E}}[XY]-{\mathbb {E}}[X]{\mathbb {E}}[Y])/(\sigma _{X} \sigma _{Y})\) and it can be expressed as \(\rho ={\sigma _{Z}^{2}}/(\sigma _{X} \sigma _{Y})\).
where R is zero-mean noise. This way of expressing Y is motivated by the first and second order statistics, i.e., the variance of Y is \(\lambda ^{2} {\sigma _{X}^{2}}+\sigma ^{2}={\sigma _{Y}^{2}}\), and the correlation between X and Y is \({\mathbb {E}}[XY]/(\sigma _{X}\sigma _{Y})=\lambda {\sigma _{X}^{2}}/(\sigma _{X}\sigma _{Y})=\rho \).
In the case of Gaussian Z,N e,N v, the X and Y are Gaussian, and the noise R is Gaussian as well.
From (7), it follows that the PDF of y given x (i.e., the noise between enrollment and verification) is centered on λ x and has variance σ 2. The parameter λ is called the attenuation parameter. In the "identical conditions" case σ e=σ v it holds that \(\lambda =\rho ={\sigma _{Z}^{2}}/\left ({\sigma _{Z}^{2}}+\sigma _{\mathrm {v}}^{2}\right)\). In the "noiseless enrollment" case σ e=0 we have λ=1 and \(\rho =\sigma _{Z}/\sqrt {{\sigma _{Z}^{2}}+\sigma _{\mathrm {v}}^{2}}\).
We will adopt expression (7) as our noise model.
In Section 5.1, we will be considering a class of noise distributions that we call symmetric fading noise.
Definition 3.2.
Equation (8) reflects the property that small noise excursions are more likely than large ones, and that the sign of the noise is equally likely to be positive or negative. Gaussian noise is an example of symmetric fading noise.
4 Zero leakage: quantile helper data
In Section 4.1, we present a chain of arguments from which we conclude that, for ZL helper data, it is sufficient to consider only functions g with the following properties: (1) covering \(\mathcal {W}\) on each quantization interval (surjective); (2) monotonically increasing on each quantization interval. This is then used in Section 4.2 to derive the main result, Theorem 4.8: Zero Leakage is equivalent to having helper data obeying a specific quantile rule. This rule makes it possible to construct a very simple ZL HDS which is entirely generic.
4.1 Why it is sufficient to consider monotonically increasing surjective functions g
The reasoning in this section is as follows. We define sibling points as points x in different quantization intervals but with equal w. We first show that for every w, there must be at least one sibling point in each interval (surjectivity); then, we demonstrate that having more than one is bad for the reconstruction error rate. This establishes that each interval must contain exactly one sibling point for each w. Then, we show that the ordering of sibling points must be the same in each interval, because otherwise the error rate increases. Finally, assuming g to be differentiable yields the monotonicity property.
The verifier has to reconstruct x based on y and w. In general this is done by first identifying which points \(x\in \mathbb R\) are compatible with w, and then selecting which one is most likely, given y and w. For the first step, we introduce the concept of sibling points.
Definition 4.1.
(Sibling points): Two points \(x,x'\in \mathbb {R}\) , with x≠x ′ , are called Sibling Points if g(x)=g(x ′).
The verifier determines a set \({\mathcal {X}}_{w}=\{x\in \mathbb {R}| g(x)=w\}\) of sibling points that correspond to helper data value w. We write \({\mathcal {X}}_{w}=\cup _{s\in {\mathcal {S}}}{\mathcal {X}}_{sw}\), with \({\mathcal {X}}_{sw}=\{x\in \mathbb {R}| Q(x)=s\wedge g(x)=w\}\). We derive a number of requirements on the sets \({\mathcal {X}}_{sw}\).
Lemma 4.2.
Proof: see Appendix A.1 Proof of Lemma 4.2. Lemma 4.2 tells us that there is significant leakage if there is not at least one sibling point compatible with w in each interval A s , for all \(w\in \mathcal {W}\). Since we are interested in zero leakage, we will from this point onward consider only functions g such that \({\mathcal {X}}_{sw}\neq \emptyset \) for all s,w.
Next, we look at the requirement of low reconstruction error probability. We focus on the minimum distance between sibling points that belong to different quantization intervals.
Definition 4.3.
We take the approach of maximizing D min. It is intuitively clear that such an approach yields low error rates given the noise model introduced in Section 3.3. The following lemma gives a constraint that improves the D min.
Lemma 4.4.
Let \(w\in \mathcal {W}\) and \({\mathcal {X}}_{sw}\neq \emptyset \) for all \(s\in \mathcal {S}\) . The D min(w)is maximized by setting \(|{\mathcal {X}}_{sw}|= 1\) for all \(s\in \mathcal {S}\).
Proof: see Appendix A.2 Proof of Lemma 4.4. Lemma 4.4 states that each quantization interval A s should contain exactly one point x compatible with w. From here onward we will only consider functions g with this property.
The set \({\mathcal {X}}_{sw}\) consists of a single point which we will denote as x sw . Note that g is then an invertible function on each interval A s . For given \(w\in \mathcal {W}\), we now have a set \({\mathcal {X}}_{w}=\cup _{s\in \mathcal {S}}x_{sw}\) that consists of one sibling point per quantization interval. This vastly simplifies the analysis. Our next step is to put further constraints on g.
Lemma 4.5.
- 1.
g(x 3)=w 1; g(x 4)=w 2
- 2.
g(x 4)=w 1; g(x 3)=w 2.
Proof: see Appendix A.3 Proof of Lemma 4.5. Lemma 4.5 tells us that the ordering of sibling points should be the same in each quantization interval, for otherwise the overall minimum distance D min suffers. If, for some s, a point x with helper data w 2 is higher than a point with helper data w 1, then this order has to be the same for all intervals.
The combination of having a preserved order (Lemma 4.5) together with g being invertible on each interval (Lemma 4.4) points us in the direction of "smooth" functions. If g is piecewise differentiable, then we can formulate a simple constraint as follows.
Theorem 4.6.
(sign of g ′ equal on each A s ):Let x s ∈A s ,x t ∈A t be sibling points as defined in Def. 4.1 . Let g be differentiable in x s and x t . Then having sign g ′(x s )=sign g ′(x t )leads to a higher D min than sign g ′(x s )≠sign g ′(x t ).
Proof: see Appendix A.4 Proof of Theorem 4.5.
If we consider a function g that is differentiable on each quantization interval, then (1) its piecewise invertibility implies that it has to be either monotonously increasing or monotonously decreasing on each interval, and (2) Theorem 4.5 then implies that it has to be either increasing on all intervals or decreasing on all intervals.
Of course there is no reason to assume that g is piecewise differentiable. For instance, take a piecewise differentiable g and apply a permutation to the w-axis. This procedure yields a function g 2 which, in terms of error probabilities, has exactly the same performance as g, but is not differentiable (nor even continuous). Thus, there exist huge equivalence classes of helper data generating functions that satisfy invertibility (Lemma 4.4) and proper ordering (Lemma 4.5). This brings us to the following conjecture, which allows us to concentrate on functions that are easy to analyze.
Conjecture 4.7.
Without loss of generality we can choose the function g to be differentiable on each quantization interval \(A_{s},s\in \mathcal {S}\).
Based on Conjecture 4.7, we will consider only functions g that are monotonically increasing on each interval. This assumption is in line with all (first stage) HDSs [4, 6, 8] known to us.
4.2 Quantile helper data
We state our main result in the theorem below.
Theorem 4.8.
Proof: see Appendix A.5 Proof of Theorem 4.8.
Corollary 4.9.
Immediately follows by combining Eq. (13) with the fact that \(p_{s}=1/N\;\forall s\in \mathcal {S}\) in a FE scheme, and with the FE quantization boundaries given in Eq. (5).
Equation (16) coincides with the continuum limit of the Fuzzy extractor construction by Verbitskiy et al. [7]. A similar equation was later independently proposed for uniform key generation from a noisy channel by Ye et al. [25]. Equation (15) is the simplest way to implement an enrollment that satisfies the sibling point relation of Theorem 4.8. However, it is not the only way. For instance, by applying any invertible function to w, a new helper data scheme is obtained that also satisfies the sibling point relation (13) and hence is ZL. Another example is to store the whole set of sibling points \(\{x_{tw}\}_{t\in \mathcal {S}}\); this contains exactly the same information as w. The transformed scheme can be seen as merely a different representation of the "basic" ZL HDS (15). Such a representation may have various advantages over (15), e.g., allowing for a faster reconstruction procedure, while being completely equivalent in terms of the ZL property. We will see such a case in Section 5.3.
5 Optimal reconstruction
5.1 Maximum likelihood and thresholds
The goal of the HDS reconstruction algorithm Rep(y,w) is to reliably reproduce the secret s. The best way to achieve this is to choose the most probable \(\hat {s}\) given y and w, i.e., a maximum likelihood algorithm. We derive optimal decision intervals for the reconstruction phase in a Zero Leakage Fuzzy Extractor.
Lemma 5.1.
Proof: see Appendix A.6 Proof of Lemma 5.1. To simplify the verification phase we can identify thresholds τ s that denote the lower boundary of a decision region. If τ s ≤y<τ s+1, we reconstruct \(\hat {s}=s\). The τ 0=−∞ and τ N =∞ are fixed, which implies we have to find optimal values only for the N−1 variables τ 1,…,τ N−1 as a function of w.
Theorem 5.2.
Since \(g_{s}^{-1}(w)\neq g_{s-1}^{-1}(w)\) the only viable solution is Eq. (19).
Instead of storing the ZL helper data w according to (15), one can also store the set of thresholds τ 1,…,τ N−1. This contains precisely the same information, and allows for quicker reconstruction of s: just a thresholding operation on y and the τ s values, which can be implemented on computationally limited devices.
5.2 Special case: 1-bit secret
In the case of a one-bit secret s, i.e., N=2, the above ZL FE scheme is reduced to storing a single threshold τ 1.
It is interesting and somewhat counterintuitive that this yields a threshold for verification that does not leak information about the secret. In case the average of X is zero, one might assume that a positive threshold value implies s=0. However, both s=0 and s=1 allow positive as well as negative τ 1, dependent on the relative location of x in the quantization interval.
5.3 FE: equivalent choices for the quantization
Let us reconsider the quantization function Q(x) in the case of a Fuzzy extractor. Let us fix N and take the g(x) as specified in Eq. (16). Then, it is possible to find an infinite number of different functions Q that will conserve the ZL property and lead to exactly the same error rate as the original scheme. This is seen as follows. For any w∈[0,1), there is an N-tuplet of sibling points. Without any impact on the reconstruction performance, we can permute the s-values of these points; the error rate of the reconstruction procedure depends only on the x-values of the sibling points, not on the s-label they carry. It is allowed to do this permutation for every w independently, resulting in an infinite equivalence class of Q-functions. The choice we made in Section 3 yields the simplest function in an equivalence class.
6 Example: Gaussian features and BCH codes
To benchmark the reproduction performance of our scheme, we give an example based on Gaussian-distributed variables. In this example, we will assume all variables to be Gaussian distributed, though we remind the reader that our scheme specifies optimal reconstruction thresholds even for non-Gaussian distributions.
A comparison with QIM cannot be made since there the probability for an impostor to guess the enrolled secret cannot be made equal to 1/N. This would result in an unfair comparison since the other schemes are designed to possess this property. Moreover, the QIM scheme allows the reproduction error probability to be made arbitrary small by increasing the quantization width at the cost of leakage.
Also, the likelihood based classification can be tuned by setting the decision threshold. However, for this scheme, it is possible to choose a threshold such that an impostor will have a probability of 1/N to be accepted, which corresponds to the 1/N probability of guessing the enrolled secret in a FE scheme. Note that for a likelihood classifier, there is no enrolled secret since this is not a quantization scheme.
Finally, we consider the vector case of the two quantization schemes discussed above. We concluded that FQ has a larger error probability, but we now show how this relates to either false rejection or secret length when combined with a code offset method [3].
We assume i.i.d. features and therefore we can calculate false acceptance rate (FAR) and false rejection rate (FRR) based on a binomial distribution. In practice, features can be made (nearly) independent, but they will in general not be identically distributed. However, results will be similar. Furthermore we assume the error correcting code can be applied such that its error correcting properties can be fully exploited. This implies that we have to use a Gray code to label the extracted secrets before concatenation.
We used 64 i.i.d. features, each having a SNR of 17 dB, which is a typical average value for biometric features [8, 17]. From these features, we extract 2 bits per feature on which we apply BCH codes with a code length of 127. (We omit one bit). For analysis, we have also included the code (127,127,0), which is not an actual code, but represents the case in which no error correction is applied.
7 Conclusions
In this paper, we have studied a generic helper data scheme (HDS) which comprises the Fuzzy extractor (FE) and the secure sketch (SS) as special cases. In particular, we have looked at the zero leakage (ZL) property of HDSs in the case of a one-dimensional continuous source X and continuous helper data W.
We make minimal assumptions, justified by Conjecture 4.7: we consider only monotonic g(x). We have shown that the ZL property implies the existence of sibling points \(\{x_{sw}\}_{s\in \mathcal {S}}\) for every w. These are values of x that have the same helper data w. Furthermore, the ZL requirement is equivalent to a quantile relationship (Theorem 4.8) between the sibling points. This directly leads to Eq. (15) for computing w from x. (Applying any reversible function to this w yields a completely equivalent helper data system.) The special case of a FE (p s =1/N) yields the m→∞ limit of the Verbitskiy et al. [7] construction.
We have derived reconstruction thresholds τ s for a ZL FE that minimize the error rate in the reconstruction of s (Theorem 5.2). This result holds under very mild assumptions on the noise: symmetric and fading. Equation (19) contains the attenuation parameter λ, which follows from the noise model as specified in Section 3.3.
Finally, we have analyzed reproduction performance in an all-Gaussian example. Fixed quantization struggles with inherent high error probability, while the ZL FE with optimal reproduction follows the performance of the optimal classification algorithm. This results in a larger key size in the protected template compared to the fixed quantization scheme, since an ECC with a larger message length can be applied in the second stage HDS to achieve the same FRR.
In this paper, we have focused on arbitrary but known probability densities. Experiments with real data are beyond the scope of this paper, but have been reported in [26, 27]. A key finding there was that modeling the distributions can be problematic, especially due to statistical outliers. Even so, improvements were obtained with respect to earlier ZL schemes. We see modeling refinements as a topic for future research.
8 Endnotes
1 For information-theoretic concepts such as Shannon entropy and mutual information we refer to e.g. [24].
2 This concept is not new. Achieving zero mutual information has always been a (sometimes achievable) desideratum in the literature on fuzzy vaults/fuzzy extractors/secure sketches for discrete and continuous sources.
3 An overall Zero-Leakage scheme can be obtained in the final HDS stage even from a leaky HDS by applying privacy amplification as a post-processing step. However, this procedure discards substantial amounts of source entropy, while in many practical applications it is already a challenge to achieve reasonable security levels from biometrics without privacy protection.
9 Appendix
10 Appendix A: Proofs
10.1 A.1 Proof of Lemma 4.2
Pick any \(w\in \mathcal {W}\). The statement \(w\in {\mathcal {W}}\) means that there exists at least one \(s'\in \mathcal {S}\) such that \({\mathcal {X}}_{s'w}\neq \emptyset \). Now suppose there exists some \(s'' \in \mathcal {S}\) with \({\mathcal {X}}_{s''w}=\emptyset \). Then knowledge of w reveals information about S, i.e. \({\mathbb {P}}[S=s|W=w]\neq {\mathbb {P}}[S=s]\), which contradicts ZL.
10.2 A.2 Proof of Lemma 4.4
The D min(w) for g 2 cannot be smaller than D min(w) for g.
10.3 A.3 Proof of Lemma 4.5
We tabulate the D min(w) values for case 1 and 2,
The smallest of these distances is x 3−x 2.
10.4 A.4 Proof of Theorem 4.6
We use the fact that g(x s )=g(x t ), and that ε and δ are positive. Taking the sign of both sides of (24) and neglecting second order contributions, we get sign g ′(x s )=sign g ′(x t ).
10.5 A.5 Proof of Theorem 4.8
The result (13) follows by integration, using the fact that A s has lower boundary q s .
10.6 A.6 Proof of Lemma 5.1
We constructed the scheme to be a FE with ZL, and therefore p s =1/N and f W|S (w|s)=f W (w). We see that both p s and f W|S (w|s) do not depend on s, which implies they can be omitted from Eq. (30), yielding \(\text {Rep}({y,w})=\mathop {\arg \max }_{s\in \mathcal {S}}f_{Y|{S,W}}(y|{s,w})\). Finally, knowing S and W is equivalent to knowing X. Hence f Y|S,W (y|s,w) can be replaced by f Y|X (y|x) with x satisfying Q(x)=s and g(x)=w. The unique x value that satisfies these constraints is \(g_{s}^{-1}(w)\).
Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
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text:
Friday, October 11, 2013
Friday, November 8, 2013
Friday, January 24, 2014
Friday, February 21, 2014
Friday, March 14, 2014 at 2:00pm in the Green Library IC Classroom
Friday, April 11, 2014
Friday, May 9, 2014
Workshop Summary
Topics for this workshop include an overview of Project Management and why it is fundamental for the successful completion of projects, discussion of the Project Management framework, as well as providing a short list of best practices for implementing basic Project Management principles for digital humanities projects and alt-ac work scenarios.
This workshop will be a combination of presentation and interactive activities that will empower to integrate project management best practices into your digital project.
View resources for this topic.
This workshop will cover topics including an overview of Data Management, a discussion of why it is necessary for the successful completion of digital projects, as well as providing a short list of Data Management best practices for digital humanities projects and alt-ac work scenarios currently utilized by Stanford University Libraries.
The focus of this workshop will consider the best practices necessary for successfully constructing text-based models that can be used for a myriad of qualitative analysis techniques; in particular, we will discuss both how to establish a sampling policy and framework, as well as identify different resources for humanities and social science subject areas available from the library for corpus creation.
Topics include a discussion of what metadata is, an overview of why metadata collection and management is vital for digital projects, as well as some best practices and tools for successfully documenting metadata in digital projects.
Topics for this workshop include an overview of code management principles, discussion of why code management is useful, as well as how it can be used not only for digital humanities projects but also in tasks inherent to these disciplines (i.e. the revision process).
The focus of this workshop will be to cover the skills necessary for creating a SOLR index from digital project metadata. SOLR is an open source search platform that provides full-text search capabilities, hit highlighting, faceted searching, near real-time indexing, and more. If participants are currently working on a digital project, they are asked to bring with them a spreadsheet containing the metadata for their project. Any participants not having their own metadata will be provided sample metadata for use during the workshop.
Topics include an overview of Data Preservation, a discussion of why it is necessary for the successful completion of digital projects, as well as providing both a short list of Data Management best practices for digital projects and alt-ac work scenarios, and resources currently available from Stanford University Libraries.
© Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305.

subset: commoncrawl


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South African media conglomerate Naspers
What's the big deal? The last time Naspers invested in a messaging outfit, it was a Chinese start-up called Tencent. That $34 million stake is worth more than $2 billion today, thanks to Tencent's soaring shares on the Hong Kong stock exchange. Tencent went public in 2004, with Naspers retaining a 36% stake.
Investing wisely
According to Naspers: "Tencent is the leading real-time communications platform and online community in China, with some 13 million peak simultaneous instant-messaging users and 149 million active user accounts. During the year, a wide range of new value-added services was launched, including music-streaming services, enhanced avatar-related services and online data storage services for consumers. Tencent has expanded its online games offering and has become the leading casual games operator in China."
A few days before the MXit announcement, Naspers announced another 30% investment, a $165 million investment in Mail.ru, the top email service for Russian-speaking Web users worldwide.
A work in progress
Naspers itself was originally an old-line South African newspaper company, with some stodgy Afrikaans titles and a Sunday paper aimed at black readers. Then they bought MIH Limited (MIHL), the owner and founder of M-Net, South Africa's first independent pay TV service. The tired old newspaper outfit suddenly became a dynamic media conglomerate. MIHL CEO Ton Vosloo became chairman of the combined entity, a sign that the company still intends to keep growing, rather than rest on its laurels.
The largest division, pay TV, is very profitable; operating margins have ranged from 25% to 31% over the years. M-Net became DSTV, spreading all over southern Africa and the Indian Ocean via satellite after the fall of apartheid in 1994. Now NPSN can add new subscribers at a very low cost (they typically have no competition in their markets) and put most of that new revenue on the bottom line.
NPSN also has pay TV operations in Greece and a listed Thailand joint venture called UBC.
Naspers is one of the only stocks I ever bought cheap, held for a double, sold, and then bought back after it doubled again, because it was still cheap even then. The company's consistent 20% growth has made it a stellar investment since 2003, when the shares traded around $3 (they now go for $24). My second investment is already up 50%.
With 2007 revenues slated to increase 15%, and expected profit growth of as much as 40%, Naspers is still a good buy at today's prices, and an excellent long-term investment if you want to back smart managers who know what to buy in a changing tech world. At 17, the forward P/E is cheaper than Time Warner
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Western Cape dam levels keep on climbing
The average dam level in the region now stands at 55% — a massive jump from the scary lows of just a few months back
Winter rainfall has taken the average dam levels in the Western Cape from a low of 16% nearly four months ago to 55% as of Monday.
A cold snap accompanied by rain and snowfall at the weekend is likely to contribute further to a rise in dam levels in the province.
Ceres recorded 110mm of rainfall over the past seven days and the Berg River Dam' a major dam providing water to the city of Cape Town, is 93% full.
The Western Cape's minister of local government' environmental affairs and development planning' Anton Bredell' however' urged consumers to continue using water sparingly.
"Using less must be the new normal. Even though dam levels are recovering' the message remains to conserve water'" he said.
"We remain concerned about the Karoo areas contained in the Gouritz River catchment area where the average dam levels are only at 18%.
"Areas including Beaufort West and Oudtshoorn remain under pressure. Those areas, however, are largely spring and summer rainfall areas and we hope to see some good rains move into those areas from October."
Average dam levels in the province' which has grappled with the effects of a severe drought' were at just 16% towards the end of April.
In total' dams feeding Cape Town are now at 62%.
Major dam statistics
• Theewaterskloof dam — 45% full this week (2017: 26%. Last week: 44%)
• Voëlvlei dam — 68% full this week (2017: 26%. Last week: 65%)
• Berg River Dam — 93% full this week (2017: 54%. Last week: 89%).
• Clanwilliam Dam — 99% (2017: 36%. Last week: 99%)


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Our homie, JayKin recently returned from his Japan trip. Today, he dropped a new track where he raps on a beat created by the popular producer, Onra. The cover is also designed by our friend, Shun of MMVVII.
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| Artist Updates, Journal
All content © 2019 by justalilhype!


text:
4th of July babycakes
It's our first 4th of July in New York, and we were excited to head out into the city to see the fireworks first-hand. Unfortunately a thunderstorm warning got in the way, our plans to have a picnic at Central Park had to be reserved for another occasion. I had already decided that I was going to bake these (conceptually) red, white and blue babycakes so I proceeded to alter my tried-and-tested lemon cake recipe for them.
Ingredients (for one loaf/cake tin, or 16-20 small cakes)
2 cups self-raising flour
1 cup caster sugar
2 lemons, rind and juice
2 eggs
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup plain yogurt (I used low fat)
Handful of blueberries & raspberries
Most of the ingredients you'll need — I forgot to take out the eggs. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.
It's a very simple recipe — mix the dry ingredients (self-raising flour, sugar, lemon rind) together in a large bowl. Mix the wet ingredients (oil, egg, yogurt, and lemon juice) together in a small bowl.
Mix the wet and dry ingredients together to make a smooth batter. You could mix everything together at once but I find this method to produce an evenly mixed batter much quicker. This recipe is not as sensitive, but with other mixes (with egg whites, for example) minimal mixing can be a good thing.
I used a dessert bar or mini brownie tin this time around, filling it 2/3 the way up and placing a few berries in each. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. I like to have a little bit of colour on the tops.
And here they are! I'm still getting used to the new oven, but these turned out ok considering it's the first time I'm baking with it.
I got this recipe from my an old workmate, and have used on many occasions replacing the lemon with milk, adding vanilla, using them to make iced cupcakes — it really is foolproof and they come out moist and fluffy every time. I love the simplicity of the recipe, and uses mostly pantry ingredients. I have made it much healthier than the original version that was given to me, and I like that it doesn't have huge amounts of butter. Those with a sweet tooth could put the sugar back in… or be creative and add honey, maple syrup or jam to change it up. I will at some point put the original version on here because I really love them too. Happy 4th of July!


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I really have been asleep at the wheel. I recently wrote about how happy I was about American Samoa's first ever international win. However, I missed this aspect of the story, which makes their win all the better.
There was bizarre double celebration in American Samoa this week as the tiny nation, who are ranked as the joint-worst international team in the world in FIFA's standings, not only won their first match for 17-years but did so by fielding the first ever transgender player in an official match.
Defender Johnny "Jayieh" Saelua helped the Samoans, ranked 204th, beat the mighty Tonga, ranked 202nd, 2-1 in an Oceania 2014 World Cup qualifier to end a run of 30 consecutive defeats. And, during the jubilant scenes that greeted the final whistle, head coach Thomas Rongen declared: "I've really got a female starting at centre back. Can you imagine that in England or Spain?"
Although that's not strictly true as Saelua is part of the fa'afafine – biological males who have a strong feminine gender orientation and identify as a third sex that is widely accepted in Polynesian culture. However, the defender was raised as a woman and said after the match: "The team accept me and we have that mutual respect. Which is great. It's all part of the culture."
Brilliantly, Saelua was also named 'Man of the Match' after providing an assist and making a goal-line clearance in the dying seconds of the game.


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Both Cum History II and the original Cum History are remarkable videos. Keri is daring and candid as she shares her true life erotic experiences with the viewer. No acting or pretending for the camera just genuine erotic memories and stories from a truly captivating young woman. Keri is beautiful to watch as she masturbates to orgasm while recalling her most cherished erotic encounters. I for one am grateful for her willingness to share her stories with us.
Thank you!! I'm so glad you appreciate my memories


text:
As humans we sometimes idolize, or admire people we see on TV. Even if the people we admire are playing roles on TV we tend to gravitate to the actor, as well as the character. One thing we always forget is that what we see is not always what we get. We forget those people we're looking up to are actual human beings with feelings and emotions, so when they can't or don't live up to who we think they are it can be a hard pill to swallow.
Growing up I was always a huge basketball fan. I had a huge card collection and could name almost every player on a NBA roster during the 90's era. I was a true student of the game. One day, earlier in my professional career, I ran into one of the greatest players to ever play in the NBA. For the sake of not exposing this NBA great lets call him "John Smith". I was on the west coast preparing for a NBA workout. As I was heading to the court, walking down this long narrow hallway, I saw this tall figure walking towards me. As the figure got closer I realized it was "John Smith". I tried not showing it, but I was kind of excited. I wasn't going to go full fan mode on him, but I knew it was only right for me to pay homage to someone who helped make it possible for me to play the game I love. As we got closer, about ten feet away from each other I said, "Hello Mr. Smith." He looked me right in my eye and then continued walking. I figured maybe he didn't hear me, or couldn't quite understand me because at times I just don't speak loud. When we got shoulder to shoulder in this narrow hallway, I again said, "Hello Mr.Smith." This time he gave me cold stare and an eye roll. Shocked and a little upset, the Cleveland in me came out and what I said next wasn't so nice, but it obviously got his attention. He stopped looked at me, and I stopped and looked at him, he rolled his eyes again and kept walking.
Bothered by what had happened, I told one of my good friends what had happened to me. He laughed and said, "you must didn't get the memo." I replied "what memo?" My friend at the time was playing within the organization that "John Smith" had previously played for. He said the organization actually told them that they were not allowed to talk to "John Smith" because he felt that they had not earned the right or respect in the game of basketball to talk to him. I didn't know basketball accolades excluded someone from being a decent person.
Years later, my good friend and I are sitting around talking to a Hall of Fame coach that we both know and he tells us a story about how "John Smith" sat across from him once on a plane. The Hall of Fame coach said he leaned over the aisle to introduce himself and "John Smith" gave him a blank stare and ignored his extended hand. Coach said he tried one more time and got the same result. Later that evening coach and "John Smith" ended up at the same event and "John Smith", acted as if he didn't remember what happened on the plane.
I share this story to show that not everyone is who you think they are until you actually encounter them. As a professional athlete I have emotions and like others I try not to wear the emotions on my sleeve when dealing with fans, because you never know who and how you can affect someone. I grew up idolizing Michael Jordan, now if I would have met MJ and had the experience I had with "John Smith", that would have hurt. I would have gotten over it of course, but it still would have been tough. My experiences meeting MJ was a moment I will never forget. He was nice, called me by name and even gave me some advice.
One of the best athlete to fan interactions I encountered was on behalf of Lebron James. Lebron and I were heading to the mall in Orlando. While sitting in traffic on a bridge we saw two young boys walking down the street dribbling a basketball. In typical Lebron fashion, Bron opens the door and says to the two young boys "What's up! Y'all going to hoop? Man, I love to hoop. Y'all be good." The boys never spoke, just starred with their mouths open. As we drove away, I looked back and the little boys were going crazy. They finally realized what had happened. Bron didn't have to speak to those boys that day, but I bet it made their day a lot better.
The moral of the story is that it's ok to look up to someone based on a talent that they may possess, but never put them on a pedestal so high that if they don't meet your expectations it damages you. We all have flaws, some are just not visible to everyone. On the flip side, always remember, it costs absolutely nothing to just be a decent human being. You never know who you could be dealing with and how one interaction could change things.
Till next time… STRIVE TO EXCEL!


text:
Letter from Adrian Buckley – CEO/Founder of Buckley Jewellery.
Buckley Jewellery and The ABC Trust are delighted and honoured to have been chosen as the beneficiary for the 2014 DFNI Charity Ball.
In these financially constrained times it is humbling to observe the kindness and generosity of the travel retail industry in its support of this event. All proceeds received will be used to construct a school in Kyasira, Uganda to complement the orphanage opened there in February 2013.
I founded the ABC Trust in 2012 after visiting Kyasira with my sister where we were shocked to observe the impoverished conditions in which the children were living, without running water and sanitation. It was at this moment that I decided to establish the ABC Trust to help improve living conditions for the children at Kyasira.
Through my business Buckley Jewellery, we were able to generate the funds required to construct an entirely new orphanage with the sole intention of improving the quality of life for the children that reside there.
The Orphanage was opened on the 18th of February 2013 by the Archbishop of Kampala and it now provides a safe and secure home for over 70 orphans.
It was always my ambition to build a complementary school for the orphans as education is the only route out of the poverty trap that besets many of the children in Uganda. This is why I am convinced that the money raised through this year's Charity Ball will make a huge difference for children of Kyasira not only now but for years into the future.
The school will include an administration block and one block of six class rooms which will include three nursery classes and three primary classes with the ability to extend to seven classes in the future.
I would like to conclude by thanking you all for being here tonight and for your wonderful generosity. I would also like to thank Amanda and the team at DFNI for their efforts in arranging tonight's ball.
Please enjoy your evening and thanks again.
Adrian Buckley
In our last post we saw the foundations of our new school project being laid. We are delighted with the progress our local builders are making. The structure is in place has reached roofing level – next step is to start the roof.
We are hoping to have the school operational before Easter 2015 and will provide ongoing updates as pictures become available.
With the orphanage building almost complete we are delighted to report that His Grace Cyprian Kizito Lwanga, Archbishop of Kampala will officially open the new orphanage on Monday 18th February.
Adrian together with his family including Rachel and their four children are travelling to Kampala to attend the opening ceremony. Liz and Ray Atkins who started the project will also be travelling to Uganda to meet the children and attend the opening.
We are all very excited and are looking forward to meeting His Grace during the opening ceremony.
We will then be discussing any final details that need attending to with Father Leonard , the Sisters at the orphanage and Mr Kalanda the building contractor.
Latest pictures –
Work is almost completed at the Kyasira Home of Hope.
Vital services such as water and electricity is being connected and the surrounding area made safe for the children.
We are very happy with how the work is progressing and it won't be long before the orphanage is ready for the children.
Following the rapid progress on the building front the project remains on target for completion before Christmas this year. Adrian spoke to the Sisters about requirements for the orphanage once the building is completed , it was agreed that the Trust would make additional funds available for the fixtures and fittings such as Curtains, Beds, Bed linen, mosquito nets, new clothes for the children ,new shoes for the children ,a new TV and satellite dish, a new computer to facilitate communication and to provide a learning experience for the children.
Other requirements will be addressed on an ad hoc basis as the project nears completion.
We would like to repeat our thanks to Mr Kalanda and his team at Kwewayo Contractors for the rapid and efficient progress they continue to make.


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Shropshire History
Billy Wright
to Index
William (Billy) Wright was born at Ironbridge in 1924. He went to school in Madeley and left in 1938, aged 14, to become a member of the ground staff at Wolverhampton Wanderers. He made his debut for Wolves in a B team game against Walsall Wood, after being accepted on an eight-month trial. He made his first team debut for the club aged just 15 in a 2–1 win at Notts County in 1939. The Second World War forced Wolves to suspend competitive football so Wright turned out as a guest player for Leicester City, before returning to Wolves in 1942. He joined the army in 1943 as a Physical Training Instructor but played for Wolves whenever possible, making over 100 appearances in wartime football. His international debut for the England team was in 1946 when they won 2–0 against Belgium. He was made England captain in 1948, a role he held for 90 games until his retirement. He made 105 full international appearances, scoring three times. He was also the first football player in the world to earn 100 caps.
Billy became captain of Wolves soon after the end of the war and led the team to win the First Division title three times (1953–54, 1957–58 and 1958–59) as well as the FA Cup in 1949. He only missed 31 games for Wolves during the 1950s. During his total of 541 appearances for Wolves and his 105 games for England, his disciplinary record was excellent and he was never cautioned or sent off. In 1958, he married Joy Beverley of the Beverley Sisters. Billy retired from playing in 1959 and became manager of England's youth team in 1960. In 1962, he became manager of Arsenal but his time with them was not very successful and he was dismissed in 1966. After leaving management, he became a television pundit and Head of Sport for ATV and Central Television, before retiring in 1989. However, the following year, he joined the board of directors at Wolverhampton Wanderers as part of the takeover by Sir Jack Hayward.
Statue of Billy Wright outside Wolves' stadium
In 1994, he died from pancreatic cancer, aged 70. He was cremated and his ashes were scattered on the pitch at Wolves' Molineux Stadium.


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I don't know about you, but I always like to be encouraged and blessed! I had a wonderful meeting the other day with one of our young and up-coming pastors, Kenneth Kalichi. He is still in seminary and sponsored by you, the New Life Center partners. Along with his schooling he also is pastoring at the John Wesley UMC in Chimwemwe (near Kitwe), and he is also our Field Representative for PET Zambia. He travels on his time off from school to the four corners of Zambia and beyond looking for people in need and NGO groups to help us distribute PETs throughout Africa.
Kenneth was so excited as we talked, explaining about all that God is doing in the lives of the John Wesley Church family and the Chimwemwe community. Ministries and growth are just coming to life right and left. As we talked he just beamed and you could see the eyes of Jesus looking at you. I asked him to send me an email with a bit of what has happened in just the last few weeks. I think some of you will enjoy an African pastor's point of view in ministry and love for his church. I know it has blessed me!
Delbert Groves
Last week's holidays in Zambia were miracle holidays for John Wesley United Methodist Church at Chimwemwe here in Kitwe on the Copperbelt Province of Zambia. On Friday the 1st July, 2011, we had a meeting in town with one of our Africa Task Force leaders, Mr. Joseph Monga, on Special Program On Substance Abuse and Related violence. The meeting lasted for about an hour and half. From the meeting, I went direct to church and begin to prepare for an all night prayer meeting. We bought 5 pans of bread a 2kg sugar but when the meeting was about to start, we experienced the coming of people in large numbers and it took us to go and awaken one man who owns a small grocery to buy more bread for people to have a cup of tea as it is a cold season in Zambia. God did wonders in that night and the power of the Holy Spirit was at work in Jesus name.
The following Saturday 2nd July, we connected from all night prayer meeting to the United Methodist Church, Zimbabwe Conference where I was invited with two other preachers to speak in that revival. I took the choir members with me who also attended the all night prayer meeting. These young men and women never complained when I asked them to accompany me despite coming from all night prayer meeting. They simply told me Pastor we shall always support you. This moved my heart to see how these young men and women love God. They did not even have their sleep. They are always ready to do God's will. We were blessed in this one day revival from 0900am to 1700pm.
On Monday the 4th July, we had the whole day with the young people where a number of activities happened. This included sports, prayers, teachings, Drama, Music and sharing of the meal together. We played soccer where men and women combined and we had a lot of fun. I was really blessed to see how God is raising up the New generation in our Nkana District and Zambia as a whole. The following day, Tuesday the 5th I met the choir and the praise team. We had a seminar on Music and Worship and this was another blessed day.
At our church, we also have an inter- denomination prayer group that we call morning prayers, who meet every day from Monday to Friday and this group is growing very fast to about 60 members each morning. We had this group in small numbers, about 6 people, but after combining with another group that were gathering at pastor Helen's (one of our female pastors in UMC) place, the group is really advancing and God is performing wonders at our church.
In September, Mama Sandy Groves and Mama Josephine Mbilishi are holding an Inter- denominational Entrepreneurship seminar where we are expecting more than 50 women to attend. This is another day women are looking forward to. What then can we say, "If God is on our side, who can be against us" (ROMAN 8:32). GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME AND ALL THE TIME GOD IS GOOD.
God is unveiling the Joshua Generation, Let us look out for it, it is coming! GOD BLESS YOU.
Pastor Kenneth Kalichi


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Aerospace research takes off
Aerospace research takes off
Zouheir Fawaz is the founder and principal investigator of the Facility for Research on Aerospace Materials and Engineering Structures (FRAMES) lab at Ryerson University. He and his graduate students work with several industry partners to develop and test materials and structures that improve the safety, durability and fuel efficiency of airplanes.
Read this story to learn how researchers at FRAMES lab worked with Pratt & Whitney Canada to test the next generation of biofuels.


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A donation widget can be a useful tool on your organization's website to ensure a consistent experience for donors. Mightycause's donation widget makes it easy to make a donation in less than 5 clicks on your organization's website. Our donation widget is compatible with most websites, including Medium, Tumblr and WordPress blogs.
How to Add the Donation Widget
To add your donation widget, simply login at mightycause.com/login and go to your Organization page or Fundraiser. Then, locate the sharing buttons on the left side of the screen. The donation widget is located on the bottom of these buttons, and looks like this: </>.
Click the embed button and and see the options to:
- Embed a Donation widget
- Add a donate button to your Facebook Page
- Embed a widget link to your fundraiser
- Embed a simple "Donate" button
Then, choose the embed option that's right for your website (you may need to ask your webmaster, first!).
Next, simply add the button by putting the omebed URL code or iFrame embed code into the HTML code on your website.
Please note, the donation widget works best for long-form blogs and is not available for non-HTML sites.
Have further questions? Contact the Mightycause support team at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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AUGUST 11th ~ This Day in History video by History.com ~ 1934 : Federal prisoners landed on Alcatraz | & more about history on this day in the video… A group of federal prisoners classified as "most dangerous" arrived at Alcatraz Island, in San Francisco Bay. The convicts were the first civilian prisoners to be housed in the new high-security penitentiary.
MAJOR EVENTS iN HiSTORY ON THiS DAY ~ AUGUST 11th …see the timeline below for more details, births & events…
PEOPLE BORN ON THiS DAY ~ AUGUST 11th …in production …see the timeline below for more details & more events…
DEATHS ON THiS DAY ~ AUGUST 11th ..in production …see the timeline below for more details & more events…
TiMELiNE of HiSTORY ON THiS DAY & PEOPLE BORN on AUGUST 11th
1929 ~ Babe Ruth became the 1st baseball player to hit 500 home runs, with a home run at League Park in Cleveland, Ohio.
1934 ~ The 1st civilian prisoners arrived at the Federal prison on Alcatraz Island, in San Francisco Bay.
1959 ~ Sheremetyevo International Airport, the 2nd largest airport in Russia, opened.
1960 ~ Chad declared independence.
1962 ~ Vostok 3 launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome and cosmonaut Andrian Nikolayev became the 1st person to float in microgravity.
1968 ~ The last steam hauled train ran on the British Rail.
1972 ~ The last United States ground combat unit left South Vietnam, during the Vietnam War.
1979 ~ Two Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-134s collided over the Ukrainian city of Dniprodzerzhynsk and crashed, killing all 178 people aboard both airliners.
1982 ~ A bomb exploded on Pan Am Flight 830, en route from Tokyo to Honolulu, killing one teenager and injuring 15 passengers.
1984 ~ "We begin bombing in five minutes" President Ronald Reagan, while running for re-election, joked while preparing to make his weekly Saturday address on National Public Radio.
..more in production


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420 Cannabis Seeds UK Reviews
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Fast response quick delivery + gratis items 100%
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By Bruce Hoffmann, RRT, Director of Respiratory Care
CHI St. Alexius Health Dickinson
For pediatric asthma patients living in Western North Dakota and beyond, regular check-ups to monitor their asthma just got closer to home.
CHI St. Alexius Health Dickinson now sees pediatric asthma patients the third Wednesday of every month thanks to a collaboration with the Regional Children's Asthma Clinic and UND Center for Family Medicine in Bismarck.
Pediatric asthma patients are seen up to age 21 sometimes drive for hours just to come to their appointment with the asthma specialists at the Regional Children's Asthma Clinic in Lincoln (south of Bismarck.) Now thanks to telemedicine technology, those patients can make appointments in Dickinson instead, saving on time and travel expenses.
How it works:
When a patient attends Dickinson's Pediatric Asthma Clinic, they receive the same set of services as are available in a normal clinic setting. They will be interviewed and examined by a resident physician and/or asthma educator located at CHI St. Alexius Health Bismarck via live video.
A respiratory therapist in Dickinson performs a pulmonary function spirometry test and assists in the patient exam and education. A Jedmed scope is used for the exam, which allows the resident physician and asthma educator in Bismarck see the ears, nose, and throat in live video on the computer screen, as if they were using the scope themselves. Breath sounds are also able to be heard over the speakers.
Based on this information, an assessment of the condition will be made, along with a corresponding plan. The plan will be shared with the patient and his/her caretaker, who will also receive education about asthma and training regarding use of the medications as well as self-assessment of their asthma.
All patients with asthma will have an asthma action plan completed that they may use at school and home to help manage asthma. Necessary school forms may also be completed while at clinic. Eligible patients may also be registered to participate in the e-Asthma Tracker.
All of this information will then be shared with an attending physician who has experience in the Children's Regional Asthma Clinic in Bismarck, and that physician will verify the assessment and plan of each patient. Any modifications to the assessment and/or plan will be conveyed to the patient/caretaker in a timely manner.
Since the initial asthma clinic opened in Dickinson in November of 2017, patient satisfaction surveys have been very positive for the first Telemedicine Asthma Clinic in the State. Future plans are to open additional telemedicine asthma clinics in other communities in North Dakota as CHI St Alexius Health and UND Center for Family Medicine expand pediatric asthma services across our region and the patients we serve.
Save on travel and schedule your child's asthma appointment in Dickinson by calling the Regional Children's Asthma Clinic at 701-530-8538.


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UX/UI Design
UX and UI for MProfit, a cloud-based portfolio management and accounting software
What we did
MProfit provides clients with a desktop software for portfolio management and accounting. They approached us to re-think and re-invent their UX and UI to become a cloud-based application available as a desktop and a mobile application.
I have worked with designaren on multiple projects. Working with the team was great because they really understood the business objectives we were trying to achieve."
-Manish Jain, Advisor to MProfit
Designaren was readily available during critical times such as the technical implementation of the app."
-Manish Jain, Advisor to MProfit


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I've commenced work on the hotend. I had to drill out the 5mm hole in the Al heater block to take the >6mm 5.8 ohm resistor. In addition I had to drill a hole for the 0.8 mm thermistor. Not having a 0.8 mm drill bit, I turned to my trusty laser which did the job nicely.
laser drilling of Al heater block (material ejection and plasma emission visible):
laser drilled hole + thermistor alongside:
After that I followed Arcol's excellent assembly instructions – hope he doesn't mind 🙂
Resistor in heater block:
thermistor + fire cement:
I've left the fire cement to set overnight. There's probably too much of it but I was trying to encaspsulate as much of the crimped section as possible for strength. I'll test it tomorrow. One worry is that the resistor protrudes from the heater block. I'm afraid of hotspots where the temperature rise outside the block may exceed the limit and fry the resistor… but we'll see tomorrow.


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A number of approaches have been introduced to initiate what has been termed 'active learning'. These approaches include peer instruction, concept question, discussion, discovery laboratories, team assignments and 'minute' essays. Exploring the effectiveness of conceptual change text oriented instruction based on analogies is one of the main ideas, if not the main idea of this study.
To harness and overcome the misconceptions of undergraduate chemistry students, will in this case relate new information to the student's real world experiences (Thiele & Treagust, 1994). According to literature all these experiences are embedded in embodied conceptions (Niebert, Marsch, & Treagust, 2012; Niebert & Gropengiesser, 2013). The on-going research is based on these emerging theories, thereby encouraging students recognise errors in conceptions in coordination chemistry, reject those conceptions, and adopt new conceptions that are in line with and accepted by the scientific environments.


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Hampton Inn Raleigh/Garner
110 Drexmere Street
27529 Garner
Rooms: 67
Class: 3 stars
Check in: 15:00
Check out: 11:00
Click on a room to see detailed prices. Room rates depend on your arrival and departure dates. Above is an average for the last few weeks.
Upon check-in photo identification and credit card is required. All special requests are subject to availability upon check-in. Special requests cannot be guaranteed and may incur additional charges. Guests are required to show a photo identification and credit card upon check-in. Please note that all Special Requests are subject to availability and additional charges may apply.


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Rival telecom players Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have crossed swords yet again with the Mukesh Ambani-led startup accusing the Sunil Bharti Mittal-led firm of violating rules to offer eSIM services on Apple watches.
Latest entrant Jio has filed a complaint with the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) alleging that Airtel has located the network node, crucial to provide eSIM service on Apple Watch Series 3, outside India. This goes against the terms and conditions of Unified License rules that require the node to be located within the country, Jio has alleged.
Airtel, however, has denied the charge saying DoT was duly notified prior to the launch of Apple.
An eSIM is necessary for a user who has both an iPhone and an Apple Watch to use a common number on both gadgets. The eSIM is crucial to make or receive calls on one device irrespective of the status of the other.
The eSIM is paired with the iPhone SIM wirelessly through a dedicated network node. The node used for eSIM profile allocation contains network and user information such as operator identifier, SIM details, PIN and remote SIM file management.
Jio alleged that Airtel has deliberately chosen to install the critical eSIM provisioning node outside the country.
"We request your good office to take severe action against M/s Bharti Airtel Limited and impose the strictest of penalties under the License. Furthermore, we request you to direct Airtel to immediately stop this service and start this service only upon complying with the requirements of national security and addressing the violations of the license terms and conditions," Jio said in a letter to DoT.
Jio also said Airtel should have carried out lawful interception and monitoring, but it is not aware of any demonstration carried out by Airtel prior to the service launch so that important national security interests are not compromised.
An Airtel spokesperson called the allegations frivolous. "This is yet another frivolous complaint by a desperate operator, whose sole aim, it appears, is to have a monopoly over everything that they do," the spokesperson told Mail Today.
"Bharti Airtel is a law abiding and responsible operator. DoT was duly notified prior to the launch of Apple watch including product features, network architecture and lawful interception and we have also requested them to carry out a demonstration of the same," they added.
The spokesperson said all information relating to customers, network nodes etc is hosted in a fully secure manner by Airtel India along with provision for lawful interception. "We will be happy to share more details with the DoT as and when required."
Both Airtel and Jio have been selling Apple Watch Series 3 from May 11 through their sales channels. This is the latest spat between the two rivals since competition intensified in the sector after Jio's debut in September 2016 with dirt cheap data and free voice calls.
The two have been locking horns over misleading ads about data plans, network speeds and interconnection points among others.


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Warren Buffett, the "Legendary investor" is an American billionaire who has built his fortune thanks to the stock market trading investment technique.
He was born in 1930 in Omaha. Thanks to his father who worked in the financial world, Buffett junior displayed an amazing aptitude for both business and money from a very early age. At only 6, he already had an interest in making and saving money by reselling chewing gum, Coca-Cola bottles, etc. At 11, he purchased three shares of Cities Service Preferred. This first investment taught him one of the basic lessons of investing: patience is a virtue.
After he graduated from High School, his father sent him to the University of Pennsylvania. Warren Buffett found academic life boring, claiming he knew more than his professors. Later on, he went to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration in only 3 years. Afterwards he applied for the well-known Harvard Business School but against all odds, he was rejected because he was "too young". He eventually applied for Columbia where he met Ben Graham and David Dodd, two famous investors who became Warren's mentors.
At 25, Buffett began a limited stock market trading investment partnership. But fourteen years later, when his fortune had grown to be worth over US$25 million, he decided to stop this investment method because it had become too speculative.
His greatest achievement is undeniably Berkshire Hathaway, a textile manufacturing firm which diversified later on thanks to his investing talent. He is currently the primary shareholder, chairman and CEO of this empire. The investing career of Warren Buffett is one of the longest and most successful ever.
The billionaire
His brilliant career allowed him to be ranked by Forbes as the richest person in the world in 2008. He is at the moment the third wealthiest man in the world, just after Carlos Slim Helú and Bill Gates. This latter is also one of Warren's best friends. Over time, they discovered they shared a passion for Bridge.
The philanthropist
There is another side to Warren Buffett: his philanthropy. He is indeed a very generous man, who donates billions to charities and encourages other wealthy personalities to do the same. Furthermore Warren Buffett recently claimed that the American tax system was unfair because a billionaire paid less in taxes than a middle-class family. That's why the American President Barrack Obama proposed a "Buffett Tax" to make the system more balanced.
Moreover despite his wealth, Buffett appears to be very down-to-earth. Indeed the billionaire still lives in a small house, drives his own car and doesn't have any security people around him.
While he is considered as one of the world's greatest businessmen, his moral qualities and his simplicity differentiate him from numbers of other billionaires.
Justine O. & Loïc T.


text: Digital Jill Abramson is Tweeting By Chris O'Shea|June 10, 2011Share By Chris O'Shea|June 10, 2011Share When we heard that Jill Abramson was going to be taking over at The New York Times, our speculation was that there will be a noticeable digital focus at the paper. We then needled Abramson a bit because for all her digital prowess, she still hadn't signed up for Twitter. But yesterday she signed up, and we're glad she did. So far she's only tweeted three times (once to rebuke Felix Salmon) but that'll surely change soon. She's also only following 71 accounts, and the fact that one of those isn't us doesn't make us sad at all. Share http://adweek.it/2kyqcld copy Adweek Adweek


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Hi guys! Today I wanted to share with you some cute stuff that I got yesterday! I had to take a photo of them the same day I got them so that I can start wearing/using them. Already from the first photo its obvious that I got bralette and eyeglasses. I ordered them from online shopping store that I have recently discovered and already talked about-Banggood. Make sure to check one of my recent post for more information on this store. My package came pretty quick, in about 3 weeks. Let me talk about these cute eyeglasses. I got them in gold color but you can get them in silver as well. I always wanted to wear glasses, it always looked cool to me, but hey, isn't this so much better option-not having to wear them because my eyes are healthy but still being able to be fashionable and to wear them?! It's so cool! They are unisex so both men and women can wear them and it comes in one size (you can see the measurement in product description). You will pay only $4.89 for it. And may I say that I feel so smart wearing them! Next thing I got is this cute lace bralette in white color. It has flower lace all over it and is sheer. You can also get it in black color. There are all sizes to choose from and I chose the L size and it fits perfect on me! You can see the size chart in product description. It has adjustable shoulder straps. I am definitely thinking about ordering the one in the black color.
Do you like these items?


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Today, from 4 – 6 p.m., Robicelli's Bakery will be giving away free Nutellasagna at the Renaissance Hotel Times Square (7th Avenue and 48th Street). What is this delicious treat you ask? It's layers of buttery lasagna noodles, cannoli custard, crunchy roasted hazelnuts, chopped Belgian chocolate and thick swirls of Nutella.
I'm guessing these won't last that long, so get there early to grab a slice!


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Location: Columbus, OH
Continental Building Company is seeking a Project Manager (with multifamily and/or senior living experience a plus) for the Columbus regional office. This person will provide overall management direction to multiple projects, establish and enforce project objectives and policies, maintain liaison with the owner and with prime client contract, monitor and report project financial performance as well as all construction activities and provide administrative direction for the on-site construction superintendent.
Job Requirements
- Multifamily and/or senior living construction experience a plus.
- Minimum five (5) years direct Project Manager experience in commercial construction is required.
- Ability to inspire and lead project teams.
- Engineering/Architectural degree desirable but not required.
- Estimating, scheduling, and budgeting of construction projects
- Strong communication, organization, and management skills
- Ability to handle multiple large projects concurrently.
- Experience in grocery store construction, large commercial office buildings, tenant improvement projects, new building including site improvements, remodels, and expansions a major plus.
- Ability to build and update project CPM schedules.
- Ability to administer project pre-construction activities including estimating, buyout, scope review and award of projects.
- Ability to coordinate, administer and lead project coordination meetings with Owner / AE and subcontractors.
- Manage project punch out and close out.
- Ability to produce subcontracts, change orders, owner change order requests, purchase orders, RFIs.
- Proficiency with producing and managing monthly job cost reports and projections.
- Desired computer software experience includes:
- Timberline Project Accounting
- Microsoft Project Scheduling Software
- Microsoft Office
If interested in this posting, please send your resume to firstname.lastname@example.com