Dear Readers:

This issue contains five papers with various subjects. I do hope you will like them and will keep submitting good papers to J.UCS! Please do not forget that J.UCS is one of the very few serious electronic publications where readers can make comments for themselves or others: do make use of this, and check out: http://www.iicm.edu/jucs_annotations.

It is my sad duty to inform you that one of our most outstanding editors, Professor Harold Highland, who has been one of the early and staunch supporters and founding editors of J.UCS, has passed away. Professor Highland has been an outstanding scientist and driving force in the area of crytography and security. Among the many honours awarded to him was the Kristian Beckman Award in 1993. The community and J.UCS will miss his support, his ideas and his constant willingness to help out when help was needed.

J.UCS honours the memory of Harold Highman and conveys its deepest condolences to his wife Esther.