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<p>In an increasingly interconnected world, technology is now central to the operations of most businesses. In this environment, businesses of all sizes face an ever-growing threat from cyberattacks. Successful cyberattacks can result in data breaches, which may lead to financial loss, business interruptions, regulatory fines, and reputational damage. In 2021, the losses from cyber attacks in the United States were estimated at $6.9 Billion.</p> <p>Confronting the threat of cyberattacks can be particularly challenging for small businesses, which must defend themselves using a smaller budget and less in-house talent while balancing the pursuit of growth. Risk assessments are one method for organizations to determine how to best use their cybersecurity budgets. However, for small businesses, a risk assessment may require a significant portion of the budget which could otherwise be used to implement cybersecurity controls.</p> <p>This research builds on existing research from Lerums et al. for simulating a phishing attack to present a model that very small businesses may use in place of or as a precursor to a risk assessment. The updated model includes sensible default values for the cost and effectiveness of cybersecurity controls as well as the number of cyberattacks expected per year. Default values are based on academic literature, technical reports, and vendor estimates, but they may all be changed by organizations using the model. The updated model can also be tailored by non-technical users to reflect their network, relevant threat actors, and budget. Lastly, the updated model can output an optimized control set that yields the maximum annual net return and the single control with the greatest annual return on investment based on a user's inputs.</p> <p>After construction, the updated model is tested on organizations with 5, 25, and 50 employees facing varied sets of threat actors and attacks per year. Key takeaways include the high net return of all security controls tested, benefits of defense-in-depth strategies for maximizing return across multiple attack types, and the role of threat actors in tempering high estimates of security control effectiveness.</p> <p>    </p> <p>All code and releases are open source and available from: <a href="https://github.com/gjhami/AttackSimulation" target="_blank">https://github.com/gjhami/AttackSimulation</a>.</p>

[pt] As ações de valor tendem a ter retornos mais altos, em média. Seu desempenho é particularmente mais forte quando o spread de valor, definido pelas diferenças nos índices B/M, entre ações de valor e crescimento é maior. Neste artigo, mostramos que essa previsibilidade se torna ainda mais forte quando contabilizamos o spread no crescimento, medido pelas expectativas de curto prazo, expectativas de longo prazo e crescimento passado. Utilizamos as expectativas dos analistas com relação ao lucro de cada empresa para construir uma série de proxies para as expectativas de crescimento de lucros. Concluímos que adicionar a razão de crescimento aumenta muito o poder preditivo também em testes fora da amostra. / [en] Value stocks tend to have higher returns on average. Their performance is particularly stronger when the value spread, defined by differences in B/M ratios, between value and growth stocks is wider. In this paper, we show that this predictability becomes even stronger when we account for the spread in growth, measured by short-term expectations, long-term expectations, and past growth. We use analyst expectations on individual firm s earnings to construct a range of proxies for earnings growth expectations. We find that adding the growth spread greatly increases the predictive power also in out-of-sample tests.

Plastics have become an integral part of modern life and global use is expected to grow almost two- fold until 2040. 40% of European demand for plastic raw materials is driven by the packaging industry and being a cheap material, focus on waste management has historically been neglected. Sweden introduced a law on extended producer responsibility in 1994, due to which a national recycling system for plastic packaging was introduced, arranged by the producer owned organisation FTI. By 2017, official data stated that the national recycling rate reached 46%, surpassing the target of 30% recycling. However, this figure has been disputed by both governmental and industry reports stating that the true recycling rate could be as low as 14%. With stricter recycling targets arriving in the upcoming decade, framed by the EU circular economy package, new strategies for managing plastic packaging waste are needed.  Alongside the recycling system arranged by FTI, Sweden also has a national deposit return system for the collection of PET bottles. This system continuously generates higher recycling rates than the FTI system, and extending the deposit return system to include other types of plastic packaging could be a way of reaching future targets for plastic packaging recycling. This thesis aims to evaluate the environmental impact of an extended deposit return system in a comparative LCA, with the recycling system organised by FTI as a baseline scenario (S0). Two scenarios with an extended deposit return system have been developed; one based on the current system for PET bottles with national collection (S1), and one based on reuse practices on a local scale, with take-away packaging from restaurants and cafés (S2). The LCA focuses on three impact categories related to circular economy targets – global warming, terrestrial ecotoxicity and fossil resource scarcity. With little previous research on extended deposit return systems and reuse practices in a Swedish setting, this thesis is a first attempt to explore possible extended deposit return system configurations and their associated environmental impacts.  The results show that S2 generates the lowest environmental impact in the analysed impact categories, whereas S0 generates the highest environmental impact in the analysed impact categories. Production of virgin packaging and incineration of waste packaging are the most contributing processes toward global warming results. For terrestrial ecotoxicity, incineration of packaging along with break wear emissions from transports contributes most. For fossil resource scarcity, production of virgin plastic granulate is the most contributing process.  To reduce the environmental impact of plastic management in Sweden, the results highlight the importance of lowering demand for virgin plastic packaging production and minimising incineration of waste plastic packaging. This can be achieved by increasing reuse practices, increasing collection rates and facilitating greater recycling rates by improving packaging design. An additional conclusion is that access to regional and site-specific data needs to be better, to increase the reliability of studies of Swedish waste management systems. / Användningen av plast har ökat explosionsartat under de senaste 70 åren och är idag en oumbärlig del av samhället. Nära 40% av plastråvaran i Europa går till plastförpackningar, men endast en mindre del av materialet återanvänds eller återvinns på årsbasis. Både inom politik och näringsliv diskuteras därför nya mål för återvinning, för ökad resurseffektivitet och minskad miljöpåverkan. I Sverige har ett producentansvarssystem, samordnat av FTI, funnits för insamling och återvinning av plastförpackningar sedan mitten av 90-talet, och nuvarande mål för plastförpackningsåtervinning är 30%. Den officiellt sammanställda statistiken visar att materialåtervinningsmålet uppnås, men på senare år har flera studier uppmärksammat att det råder dålig förståelse av flödet av plaster i Sverige, och att materialåtervinningsgraden i själva verket kan vara så låg som 14%.  Som ett parallellt insamlingssystem i Sverige finns pantsystemet, dit enbart flaskor av PET får lämnas. Pantsystemet har en högre återvinningsgrad än det system som ordnas av FTI och en utökning av pantsystemet till att inkludera andra typer av plastförpackningar kan vara en möjlig väg öka materialåtervinningsgraden för plastförpackningar i Sverige. Syftet med den här studien är att utvärdera miljöpåverkan från ett utökat pantsystem jämfört med nuvarande system som ordnas av FTI i en jämförande livscykelanalys. FTI:s återvinningssystem har modellerats som ett basscenario (S0). Två scenarier för ett utökat pantsystem har tagits fram, ett på nationell nivå baserat på det nuvarande pantsystemet (S1), och ett som fokuserar på återanvändning av plastförpackningar på lokal nivå (S2). Studien fokuserar på tre effektkategorier som relaterar till övergripande mål inom cirkulär ekonomi – global uppvärmning, marktoxicitet samt användning av fossila resurser.  Resultaten visar att S2 har lägst påverkan i de tre undersökta effektkategorierna, samtidigt som S0 har högst miljöpåverkan i de tre undersökta effektkategorierna. De processer som bidrar mest till effektkategorin global uppvärmning är tillverkning och avfallsförbränning av plastförpackningar. För marktoxicitet bidrar partikelutsläpp från lastbilars bromsar vid transport tillsammans med förbränning av plastförpackningar mest. För användning av fossila resurser är tillverkning av plastgranulat den största bidragande processen. De åtgärder som gör mest nytta i förhållande till att minska miljöpåverkan från hanteringen av plastförpackningar är minskad efterfrågan på plastgranulat genom återanvändning, att undvika förbränning av plastförpackningar genom ökad insamling samt att förbättra möjligheterna till materialåtervinning genom bättre förpackningsdesign.

Det konfliktdrabbade Turkiet är hemlandet för denna studies fyra respondenter. Syftet var att undersöka dessa internationella studentmigranters syn och uppfattning angående tre teman; migration, återvändande och våld, vilket gjordes med den instabila politiska situationen i landet i åtanke. Analysen gjordes genom en kvalitativ innehållsanalys av det producerade materialet där materialet klassificerades i koder och underkoder, för att kunna jämföra respondenternas uppfattningar utifrån den teoretiska grunden.Studien genererade en mängd resultat från vilka slutsatser kunde dras. Begreppet migration kopplades ihop med flyktingar, vilket visade på en vilja att hellre definiera sig som cirkulär migrant då detta innebär fler och bättre möjligheter i mottagarlandet, samt efter avklarade studier. Att hellre identifiera sig som en världsmedborgare än att tillhöra den nationella identiteten visades av flertalet vara viktigt. Begrepp som brain drain, brain circulation och push-pullfaktorer togs upp för att förstå processen från ett statligt perspektiv.Då våld diskuterades nämndes främst det direkta våldet, men alla respondenterna reflekterade över både strukturella och kulturella våldshandlingar så som diskriminering på olika grunder. / The conflict-threatened Turkey is the home country for this study's four respondents. The purpose was to investigate the views of international student migrants on three themes; migration, return migration and violence, which was decided upon and discussed with the unstable political situation in the country in mind. The analysis was done by a qualitative content analysis of the produced material, where the material was classified into codes and sub-codes, in order to be able to compare the respondents' perceptions based on the theoretical framework. The study generated several results from which conclusions could be drawn. The concept of migration was coupled with refugees, which indicated a willingness to better define themselves as circular migrants, as this means more and better opportunities in the recipient country, as well as after completed studies.Preferably identifying themselves as a world citizens rather than belonging to a national identity was shown by most of them. Concepts such as brain drain, brain circulation and push-pull factors were raised to understand the process from a state perspective.When violence was discussed, the direct violence was mainly mentioned, but all respondents reflected on both structural and cultural acts of violence such as discrimination on different grounds

This thesis is an attempt to find a sustainable solution for the Palestinian refugee problem. It analyzes the Palestinian refugee case and how different actors in the Palestine-Israeli conflict view it. The Palestinian refugees issue is one of the most complicated matters in the peace negotiations between the two parties and without solving it there will be no permanent and sustainable peace in the Middle East region. There is a need for compromise from both the Israelis as well as the Palestinians to find a sustainable solution for the Palestinian refugee problem. The international community in general and those who have the political, military as well as economic power in particular must play an important role in the final settlement of the issue by providing economic incentives to repatriate and compensate the Palestinian refugees. The Right of Return should be respected in any case. While some Palestinian refugees might go back to their historic home land in what nowadays is called Israel, others might have no choice but to be permanently settled in their current host countries provided that they are given full citizenship rights in their host country as well as in the promised Palestinian State.