The article discusses the intersection of anti-money laundering (AML) compliance and the handling of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) under German law or EU law applicable in Germany. It begins by acknowledging the negative perception of cryptocurrencies in the context of money laundering, emphasizing the need to explore AML regulations for NFTs, which have gained attention for tokenizing art. The text delves into the legal nature of NFTs, examining whether they can be classified as securities, asset investments, or crypto assets. It also explores the implications of these classifications on AML compliance, detailing the specific obligations for entities dealing with NFTs. The article concludes by highlighting the legal ambiguity surrounding NFTs and emphasizing the importance of conducting a case-by-case risk assessment for AML compliance.

Background: Within the emerging field of cryptocurrencies, the sub-sector DeFi (decentralized finance) has experienced explosive growth over the last year, and its importance for crypto as a whole has grown with it. The currencies have developed from simple peer-to-peer transactions to complex applications such as lending and exchanges. Several studies have researched determinants of cryptocurrency prices, and a few have focused on metrics central to DeFi, such as total value locked (TVL). However, academia has aimed sparse attention to the relationships between these metrics, which this article seeks to amend.  Aim: The purpose of this essay is to research the relationship between total value locked (TVL) in DeFi, the prices of native tokens on related platforms, and the price of ether, which is the dominant currency across DeFi.  Methodology: This study is deductive and quantitative and categorized as a causal-comparative thesis. The purpose of causal-comparative research is to find relationships between variables, independent and dependent, over a certain period.  The authors used deductive reasoning to form the hypotheses and collect the data necessary to investigate the hypothesis. Additionally, the structure of the paper and the epistemological process is quantitative and based on the scientific method.  The sources used for data gathering have primarily been DefiPulse and their API:s, retrieved using simple python coding and different applications that parse JSON code into the excel format. The transparent nature of blockchain has provided easy access to data needed for this study. Once the data was collected, it was categorized and compiled into an Excel sheet.  Conclusions: It is a considerable result that the ratio of locked ETH to total supply lacks significance for the price of ether, as it is counterintuitive to the macroeconomic theory of demand and supply. Presumably, the locked eth is not to be considered as a corresponding decrease in supply. However, if that was the case, the locked ratio of 10% is considerable and should affect the price as there is less supply available to the market.  In accordance with hypotheses two, three, and four, changes in the price of ether, TVL, and utilization rate affect the price of the native token. A notable distinction between the three different platforms lies in what metrics correlate more strongly with price changes. It for Compound and Aave was TVL, but utilization rate for MakerDAO. What causes these differences between seemingly similar platforms is a subject for further study.

The distinction between institution types and institution tokens plays an important role in Francesco Guala’s philosophy of institutions. In this commentary, I argue that this distinction faces a number of difficulties that are not sufficiently addressed in Understanding Institutions. In particular, I critically discuss Guala’s comparison between the taxonomy of organisms and the taxonomy of institutions, consider the semantics of institution terms on different levels in this taxonomy, and argue for an alternative solution to the problem of how to reconcile reformism and realism about institutions like marriage.

NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) are digital assets representing real-world objects like art, music, videos, gaming items, etc., originally, they reside on a blockchain indicating a certificate of authenticity or proof of ownership deeming the uniqueness and scarcity of commodities. They have shown astonishing market attention and inconceivable price margins are being set for certain NFTs. The NFT phenomenon being in a nascent state, not much research has been conducted from the standpoint of value from the users and this thesis tries to fill the gaps in that area from a socio-economic point of view. The use of NFTs is on a rise with several companies delving in and speculated to grow even bigger bringing a transformative shift in the way businesses work today, using the blockchain technology NFTs are heralded as a new way to define ownership and property constructs. Going forward it is expected that they could be a gateway to a tokenised future through a new form of value assessment of commodities and transitioning economic functions. This dissertation ventures on to look at the value perspective from the masses on how they shape an individual's viewpoint. Through a classical economic intervention of theories as discoursed in the literature review, this research tries to infer nuances of users employing a qualitative study whereby unstructured interviews were the source for data collection and using a thematic analysis various themes are derived which are pointed out in the discussion section. The analysis gives us an indication that many people are indulged in the NFT space as a source of profit maximisation and several indications are portrayed towards community building as a means of value creation. The qualitative nature of the study relies on interpretivism and a radical structuralist paradigm shedding light on the thought process behind an individual’s behaviour, trying to understand the context of ‘value’ as perceived by the people.

Microservices have emerged as an attractive alternative to more classical monolithic software application architectures. Microservices provides many benefits that help with code base comprehension, deployability, testability, and scalability. As the Information technology (IT) industry has grown ever larger, it makes sense for the technology giants to adopt the microservice architecture to make use of these benefits. However, with new software solutions come new security vulnerabilities, especially when the technology is new and vulnerabilities are yet to be fully mapped out. Authentication and authorization are the cornerstone of any application that has a multitude of users. However, due to the lack of studies of microservices, stemming from their relatively young age, there are no standardized design patterns for how authentication and authorization are best implemented in a microservice. This thesis investigates an existing microservice in order to secure it by applying what is known as a security design pattern for authentication and authorization. Different security patterns were tested and compared on performance. The differing levels of security provided by these approaches assisted in identifying an acceptable security versus performance trade-off. Ultimately, the goal was to give the patterns greater validity as accepted security patterns within the area of microservice security. Another goal was to find such a security pattern suitable for the given microservice used in this project. The results showed a correlation between increased security and longer response times. For the general case a security pattern which provided internal authentication and authorization but with some trust between services was suggested. If horizontal scaling was used the results showed that normal services proved to be the best target. Further, it was also revealed that for lower user counts the performance penalties were close to equal between the tested patterns. This meant that for the specific case where microservices sees lower amounts of traffic the recommended pattern was the one that implemented the maximum amount access control checks. In the case for the environment where the research were performed low amounts of traffic was seen and the recommended security pattern was therefore one that secured all services of the microservices. / Mikrotjänster har framträtt som ett mer attraktivt alternativ än mer konventionella mjukvaruapplikationsarkitekturer såsom den monolitiska. Mikrotjänster erbjuder flera fördelar som underlättar med en helhetsförståelse för kodbasen, driftsättning, testbarhet, och skalbarhet. Då IT industrin har växt sig allt större, så är det rimligt att tech jättar inför mikrotjänstarkitekturen för att kunna utnyttja dessa fördelar. Nya mjukvarulösningar medför säkerhetsproblem, speciellt då tekniken är helt ny och inte har kartlagts ordentligt. Autentisering och auktorisering utgör grunden för applikationer som har ett flertal användare. Då mikrotjänster ej hunnit blivit utförligt täckt av undersökning, på grund av sin relativt unga ålder, så finns det ej några standardiserade designmönster för hur autentisering och auktorisering är implementerade till bästa effekt i en mikrotjänst. Detta examensarbete undersöker en existerande mikrotjänst för att säkra den genom att applicera vad som är känt som ett säkerhetsdesignmönster för autentisering och auktorisering. Olika sådana mönster testades och jämfördes baserat på prestanda i olika bakgrunder. De varierade nivåerna av säkerhet från de olika angreppssätten som säkerhetsmönstrena erbjöd användes för att identifiera en acceptabel kompromiss mellan säkerhet mot prestanda. Målet är att i slutändan så kommer detta att ge mönstren en högre giltighet när det kommer till att bli accepterade som säkerhetsdesignmönster inom området av mikrotjänstsäkerhet. Ett annat mål var att hitta den bästa kandidaten bland dessa säkerhetsmönster för den givna mikrotjänsten som användes i projektet. Resultaten visade på en korrelation mellan ökad säkerhet och längre responstider. För generella fall rekommenderas det säkerhetsmönster som implementerade intern autentisering och auktorisering men med en viss del tillit mellan tjänster. Om horisontell skalning användes visade resultaten att de normala tjänsterna var de bästa valet att lägga dessa resurser på. Fortsättningsvis visade resultaten även att för ett lägre antal användare så var den negativa effekten på prestandan nästan likvärdig mellan de olika mönstren. Detta innebar att det specifika fallet då mikrotjänster ser en lägre mängd trafik så är det rekommenderade säkerhetsmönstret det som implementerad flest åtkomstkontroller. I fallet för den miljö där undersökningen tog plats förekom det en lägre mängd trafik och därför rekommenderades det säkerhetsmönster som säkrade alla tjänster närvarande i mikrotjänsten.

The chief aims of this study are to determine what, if any, accounting processes were employed during the first millennium BC (1000-332 BC) in Palestine, to determine whether these were the result of the socio-economic requirements of the various centralised polities operative in Palestine during this period, how these processes developed over the course of the first millennium and whether they conform to the definition of accounting provided in Chapter One. I have adopted an archaeological, epigraphic and qualitative approach taking into consideration the historical and socio-economic backgrounds of the different political administrations in control during the period under discussion. The evidence demonstrates that the adopted processes can be regarded as accounting processes since they conform to at least three of the four components of the definition of accounting and that these processes developed over the course of time depending on the particular requirements of the ruling authority. / Biblical and Ancient Studies / M.A. (Biblical Archaeology)

Trust is a core construct of our social lives, influencing how we interact with other individuals that are part of our social circle. Whether at work, in teams, or with friends and family, trust influences how much information we exchange with the other individuals and how we interact as a dyad. Defined as risk acceptance behaviour in situations where there is dependency between the parties, trusting another person means accepting some risks to benefit from the social integration of tasks and knowledge. In an institutional environment, trust is a core component of teamwork dynamics, having a strong influence on team effectiveness and performance. Teams are the backbone of current industry, research, healthcare, and business domains. Teams have the power to increase the momentum of projects and tasks, and may also benefit from the collective body of knowledge brought by experts from different fields. Teamwork also brings new constraints to the interpersonal dynamic; for instance, a lack of interpersonal trust can deeply impact the performance and effectiveness of a team. Without trust, communication and interaction between team members can be significantly impaired, limiting the ability of a team to perform and to become effective. As teams move to non-collocated work, the development of trust is restricted by the limited media richness of communication channels. The perceptual mechanisms that compose the major part of the trust development process become constrained, as behavioural cues are not readily available through Computer Mediated Communication Systems (CMCSs). For this reason, virtual teams can suffer from low, fragile, and delayed trust, impairing team effectiveness and performance. Given the increasing prevalence of non-collocated teams, there is a need for the development of a toolset for understanding, measuring, and fostering trust in distributed teamwork environments. The existing literature provides only a partial understanding of the trust formation process and does not encompass a detailed description of the perceptual mechanisms that would help explain trust formation and allow the design of interventions tailored at targeting trust. I started by developing a model that explains trust formation and the perceptual mechanisms involved in this process, in which I also incorporate the distinction between intuitive trust and calculative confidence. The Human Factors Interpersonal Trust State Formation Model developed in this thesis helps explain the situational variability of interpersonal trust, a very important characteristic to consider when using the knowledge about trust formation to inform design. This model explains how researchers and practitioners can develop designs and interventions to foster trust based on increasing the perception of trust-building cues. Similarly, good trust metrics must capture both a measurement of trust between two people and provide information about how each trust cue influences the formation of the trust state. With the intent of incorporating situational sensitivity to a trust metric, I designed the Quick Trust Assessment Scale (QTAS), based on the NASA-TLX structure, using a combination of direct rating of subjective subscales of trust, with a pairwise comparison of each pair of subscales. I evaluated the QTAS using Crombach’s Alpha and Factor Analysis. The results showed high internal validity and identified one component for extraction from the metric, since this component focused on measuring a construct outside the interest of the QTAS. The QTAS is the first trust metric to be developed that includes a component to measure the situational variability of trust. The next component of this thesis focuses on identifying and testing ways to foster trust in a specific other through electronic communication. To achieve this objective, I initially conducted an ethnographic study to identify how team members foster trust in face-to-face collaborations and which trust cues are most often exchanged. In this study, I identified the effect of a third party on fostering trust (liaison) and five behaviours, or trust building cues, that were most used: recommendation, validation, expertise, social network, and benevolence/willingness to help. These five behaviours were later converted into interface design objects (trust tokens), in the form of badges, to be used in CMCSs and social network environments, acting as surrogates for the missing trust cues. The trust tokens were tested on simulated social network interfaces to identify the effects of multiple latent factors. Results showed that the use of the trust tokens is independent of gender, age, education level, and personality type. However, use was dependent on the type of risk the participants were facing and their cultural background. Although trust tokens are effective in fostering trust behaviour, there was not a unified solution for every type of situation. In order to further validate the situational dependence of trust decisions, I have evaluated two major variables of interest. Through experimental manipulation, I demonstrated the influence of (1) situational risk and (2) cultural background on the use of trust cues. These findings are of relevance for the design of systems that support the development of interpersonal trust as they raise the awareness of the highly variable nature of trust. In order for designers, researchers, and practitioners to successfully influence trust behaviour in teamwork environments, they need to include interpersonal trust as a variable of interest in the design requirements of systems that support teamwork, as well as carefully consider the impact of their interventions, as their interventions will influence variably, depending on the situation and target population. Ultimately, this research program demonstrates the importance of including interpersonal trust as a variable of interest in and as a requirement for the design of systems that support teamwork and collaboration.

The chief aims of this study are to determine what, if any, accounting processes were employed during the first millennium BC (1000-332 BC) in Palestine, to determine whether these were the result of the socio-economic requirements of the various centralised polities operative in Palestine during this period, how these processes developed over the course of the first millennium and whether they conform to the definition of accounting provided in Chapter One. I have adopted an archaeological, epigraphic and qualitative approach taking into consideration the historical and socio-economic backgrounds of the different political administrations in control during the period under discussion. The evidence demonstrates that the adopted processes can be regarded as accounting processes since they conform to at least three of the four components of the definition of accounting and that these processes developed over the course of time depending on the particular requirements of the ruling authority. / Biblical and Ancient Studies / M.A. (Biblical Archaeology)

The overarching aim of the studies in this dissertation is to contribute knowledge about children’s shared social knowledge in their preschool peer cultures, regarding both content and how it is established and maintained. An ethnographic approach has been used to study the shared activities of children, aged 3-5, in the preschool. During 1 ½ years, one preschool setting was visited on a regular basis. One hundred hours of observation have been made and documented through video camera recordings and field notes. The theory of children’s peer cultures (Corsaro, 2005), positioning theory (Harré & Langenhove, 1999a) and social representation theory (Moscovici, 2001) have been used as theoretical tools in the analyses. The empirical results are presented in four articles (articles I-IV) and are all illustrations of the children’s shared social knowledge. The findings are that children’s shared social knowledge involves two main aspects of knowledge about relations; how to establish and maintain relations vis-à-vis various tokens or social resources (articles III and IV), and how to create distance to relations (articles I and II). Another find is that there seems to be a tension between the children’s social knowledge and the social norms explicitly formulated in the studied preschool context. / I den här avhandlingen undersöker Lovisa Skånfors barns sociala vardagsliv i förskolan. Det specifika syftet är att bidra med kunskap om barns gemensamma sociala kunskaper i förskolans kamratkulturer, både vad gäller dess innehåll och hur de etableras och upprätthålls. Författaren har genom ett etnografiskt arbetssätt följt barns gemensamma aktiviteter på en 3-5-årsavdelning i en svensk förskola, under 1,5 år. Resultatet visar att barns gemensamma sociala kunskaper handlar om hur man kan skapa och upprätthålla relationer och hur man kan distansera sig från relationer. Barns sociala relationer skapas och upprätthålls i relation till olika sociala resurser (rätt ålder, specifika kompetenser och tidigare etablerade relationer). Barn skapar dessutom distans till andra barn och vuxna genom att på olika sätt dra sig undan i förskolekontexten. Resultatet visar också att det tycks finnas en spänning mellan barnens gemensamma sociala kunskaper och de normer om kollektivitet som explicit formuleras i den studerade förskolekontexten. Avhandlingen vänder sig till forskare och praktiker med intresse för frågor kring förskola och förskolebarns sociala samspel.

I am fascinated by the inner thoughts, the memories, and the cumulative experience that make us each a complex physiological puzzle. From birth, sociological building blocks are constructed forming emotional walls and unexpected doorways, boundaries and comfortable passageways through the architecture of our personalities. My thesis work, which is comprised of ceramic figures and interactive toys, offers playful memory triggers and evocative spaces in which viewers can deconstruct the building blocks of their social persona.