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A New Framework for Publishing and Sharing Network and Security Datasets

Datasets are very important for network and security research and development. Despite the continuous growth in the number of available datasets, there is no effective publishing and sharing mechanisms so that realistic and representative datasets are not only hard to construct but it is difficult to select from tens of thousands of datasets scattered in online repositories. This work aims to alleviate the difficulties inherent in searching, selecting and comparing datasets as well as to decrease the ambiguity associated with dataset publication and share. In this paper we present the basis and the implementation of a new framework to describe and share network datasets with a special focus on network and security-related datasets. Hereafter, we present the underlying idea of the proposed framework and the key component of this approach: a Dataset Description Language (DDL) to express dataset metadata. Besides that, we explain how we implemented a proof-of-concept prototype to demonstrate its feasibility and usefulness, only from OSOTS (Open Source Off The Shelf). It allows us to overcome the problem of backward dealing with a huge number of already existing datasets where it generates Dataset Description Sheets (DDS) automatically for traffic datasets. The proposed approach provides several benefits where it facilitates searching in dataset repositories according to various criteria. Moreover, its output in XML format can be integrated easily with Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP) tools. It also, enhances communicating dataset properties in a clear and succinct manner.