AJIC Issue 25, 2020
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Item AJIC Issue 25, 2020 - Full Issue(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30)Articles on digital terrorism, SMS fraud, machine learning, mHealth, natural language processing, and international telecommunications law and policy.Item AJIC Issue 25, 2020 - Full Issue - print-on-demand version(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30)Articles on digital terrorism, SMS fraud, machine learning, mHealth, natural language processing, and international telecommunications law and policy.Item The Digitalised Terrorism Ecology: A Systems Perspective(2020-06-30) Ochara, Nixon Muganda; Odhiambo, Nancy Achieng; Kadyamatimba, ArmstrongThis study uses a systematic review methodology to interpret existing literature on the digital dimensions of contemporary terrorism and counter-terrorism. Using the theory of synergetics as a guiding analytical framework, the study conducts meta-synthesis of relevant literature, including application of soft systems methodology (SSM), in order to generate conceptualisation of a digitalised terrorism ecology. This ecology comprises five interacting sub-systems: open digital infrastructure; digital information ecology; digital terrorism enactment; digital capabilities; and digital enslavement.Item Application of Machine Learning Classification to Detect Fraudulent E‑wallet Deposit Notification SMSes(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30) Enkono, Fillemon S.; Suresh, NalinaFraudulent e-wallet deposit notification SMSes designed to steal money and goods from m-banking users have become pervasive in Namibia. Motivated by an observed lack of mobile applications to protect users from such deceptions, this study evaluated the ability of machine learning to detect the fraudulent e-wallet deposit notification SMSes. The naïve Bayes (NB) and support vector machine (SVM) classifiers were trained to classify both ham (desired) SMSes and scam (fraudulent) e-wallet deposit notification SMSes. The performances of the two classifier models were then evaluated. The results revealed that the SVM classifier model could detect the fraudulent SMSes more efficiently than the NB classifier.Item A Supplementary Tool for Web-archiving Using Blockchain Technology(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30) De Villiers, John E.; Calitz, André P.The usefulness of a uniform resource locator (URL) on the World Wide Web is reliant on the resource being hosted at the same URL in perpetuity. When URLs are altered or removed, this results in the resource, such as an image or document, being inaccessible. While web-archiving projects seek to prevent such a loss of online resources, providing complete backups of the web remains a formidable challenge. This article outlines the initial development and testing of a decentralised application (DApp), provisionally named Repudiation Chain, as a potential tool to help address these challenges presented by shifting URLs and uncertain web-archiving. Repudiation Chain seeks to make use of a blockchain smart contract mechanism in order to allow individual users to contribute to web-archiving. Repudiation Chain aims to offer unalterable assurance that a specific file and its URL existed at a given point in time—by generating a compact, non-reversible representation of the file at the time of its non-repudiation. If widely adopted, such a tool could contribute to decentralisation and democratisation of web-archivingItem Factors Impacting Tanzanian Rural and Peri-urban Drug Dispensaries’ Perceived Benefits from Using an mHealth Reporting System(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30) Elias, Alistair; Mtebe, Joel S.This study examines the factors impacting Tanzanian drug dispensaries’ perceptions of the potential benefits of using a mobile health (mHealth) reporting system. Since 2003, the Government of Tanzania has implemented its Accredited Drug Dispensing Outlet (ADDO) programme in support of dispensaries in under-served rural and peri-urban areas. A core element of this ADDO programme is the dispensary use of an mHealth application for reporting on the drugs they are dispensing and the medical conditions that are being treated. This study canvassed the views of ADDO programme dispensaries using the mHealth reporting system in the Iringa, Mbeya, and Njombe Regions, through a survey questionnaire completed by 318 dispensaries and focus group discussions with 38 dispensary personnel. The data revealed that four factors—system quality, information quality, service quality, and price value—are all having a statistically significant impact on dispensaries’ perceptions of the potential benefits of using the mHealth system.Item Pilot Testing of an Information Extraction (IE) Prototype for Legal Research(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30) Scholtz, Brenda; Padayachy, Thashen; Adewoyin, OluwandeThis article presents findings from pilot testing of elements of an information extraction (IE) prototype designed to assist legal researchers in engaging with case law databases. The prototype that was piloted seeks to extract, from legal case documents, relevant and accurate information on cases referred to (CRTs) in the source cases. Testing of CRT extraction from 50 source cases resulted in only 38% (n = 19) of the extractions providing an accurate number of CRTs. In respect of the prototype’s extraction of CRT attributes (case title, date, journal, and action), none of the 50 extractions produced fully accurate attribute information. The article outlines the prototype, the pilot testing process, and the test findings, and then concludes with a discussion of where the prototype needs to be improved.Item Cyber-Threat Information-Sharing Standards: A Review of Evaluation Literature(2020-06-30) Mkuzangwe, Nenekazi N. P.; Khan, Zubeida C.Cyber-threat information-sharing tools, through which cybersecurity teams share threat information, are essential to combatting today’s increasingly frequent and sophisticated cyber-attacks. Several cyber-threat information-sharing standards exist, but there is at present no single standard or set of standards widely adopted by organisations and by computer security incident response teams (CSIRTs) operating at organisational, sectoral, national, and international levels. This introduces an interoperability problem in respect of communication across the various organisations and CSIRTs. Harmonised adoption of threat information-sharing standards would be of great benefit to cybersecurity efforts. In an effort to support harmonised use of cyber-threat information-sharing standards, this article provides findings from a review of the extant literature on such standards.Item Book Review: International Telecommunications Law and Policy(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2020-06-30) Okoli, Pontian N.