An Authentication Protocol for Future Sensor Networks

Authentication is one of the essential security services in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) for ensuring secure data sessions. Sensor node authentication ensures the confidentiality and validity of data collected by the sensor node, whereas user authentication guarantees that only legitimate users can access the sensor data. In a mobile WSN, sensor and user nodes move across the network and exchange data with multiple nodes, thus experiencing the authentication process multiple times. The integration of WSNs with Internet of Things (IoT) brings forth a new kind of WSN architecture along with stricter security requirements; for instance, a sensor node or a user node may need to establish multiple concurrent secure data sessions. With concurrent data sessions, the frequency of the re-authentication process increases in proportion to the number of concurrent connections, which makes the security issue even more challenging. The currently available authentication protocols were designed for the autonomous WSN and do not account for the above requirements. In this paper, we present a novel, lightweight and efficient key exchange and authentication protocol suite called the Secure Mobile Sensor Network (SMSN) Authentication Protocol. In the SMSN a mobile node goes through an initial authentication procedure and receives a re-authentication ticket from the base station. Later a mobile node can use this re-authentication ticket when establishing multiple data exchange sessions and/or when moving across the network. This scheme reduces the communication and computational complexity of the authentication process. We proved the strength of our protocol with rigorous security analysis and simulated the SMSN and previously proposed schemes in an automated protocol verifier tool. Finally, we compared the computational complexity and communication cost against well-known authentication protocols.Comment: This article is accepted for the publication in "Sensors" journal. 29 pages, 15 figure

Facilitating the modelling and automated analysis of cryptographic protocols

Includes bibliographical references.Multi-dimensional security protocol engineering is effective for creating cryptographic protocols since it encompasses a variety of design, analysis and deployment techniques, thereby providing a higher level of confidence than individual approaches. SPEAR II, the Security Protocol Engineering and Analysis Resource n, is a protocol engineering tool built on the foundation of previous experience garnered during the SPEAR I project in 1997. The goal of the SPEAR II tool is to facilitate cryptographic protocol engineering and aid users in distilling the critical issues during an engineering session by presenting them with an appropriate level of detail and guiding them as much as possible. The SPEAR II tool currently consists of four components that have been created as part of this dissertation and integrated into one consistent and unified graphical interface: a protocol specification environment (GYPSIE), a GNY statement construction interface (Visual GNY), a Prolog-based GNY analysis engine (GYNGER) and a message rounds calculator

Formalização e verificação de um protocolo de autenticação multifator

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro Tecnológico, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciência da Computação, Florianópolis, 2012Nesta Dissertação de Mestrado, apresenta-se a proposta de um protocolo para autenticação de usuários, fazendo uso de biometria e smartcards. As principais características desse conjunto de protocolos são: prover um mecanismo próprio e integrado para cadastro e autenticação, assim como permitir a existência de diferentes papéis de usuários. Com a união destas duas características, almeja-se a obtenção de protocolos que possuam níveis aprimorados, não apenas de segurança, mas também de gerenciamento. Seu desenvolvimento é norteado pela adoção de uma metodologia própria ao projeto de protocolos de segurança. As seguintes etapas fazem parte desta metodologia: projeto inicial, prototipação, implantação, modelagem formal e verificação. A modelagem formal é feita em Lógica de Primeira Ordem. Os modelos lógicos criados são, posteriormente, alvo de verificação com auxílio de um provador automático de teoremas (em nosso caso, o SPASS). De modo a antecipar as ações de um atacante em potencial, seus possíveis movimentos são também alvo de formalização, resultando na criação de um modelo lógico próprio. Logo após, tem início a etapa de verificação, a qual consiste no teste de conjecturas sobre os modelos lógicos. O resultado deste teste permite a extração de fatos (certezas) sobre nosso conjunto de protocolos. Em última análise, estes fatos são a comprovação da resistência do protocolo a padrões conhecidos de ataque. Com a finalidade de propiciar uma visão geral da temática da verificação de protocolos de segurança, este trabalho também apresenta uma revisão dos métodos disponíveis, não se limitando apenas àqueles efetivamente utilizados neste estudo. Ademais, todo o material relativo às modelagens formais e respectivas provas é incluído como anexos.Abstract : In this Master Thesis, a proposal for a set of authentication protocols through the use of biometrics and smartcards is presented. The main characteristics of such protocols are: to provide their own integrated mechanism for user registration and authentication, as well as to differentiate the existent user roles. By combining these characteristics, we aim at creating protocols with, not only improved security levels, but also with flexible management. Their development is guided by the adoption of a proper methodology for the security protocols' project. The following steps make part of it: initial design, prototyping, deployment, formal modelling and verification. The formal modelling is carried out in First-Order Logic. The logic models created are subsequently targeted of verification with the assistance of an automated theorem prover (in this case, SPASS). To anticipate the actions from a potential attacker, his characteristics are also target of formalisation, resulting in his own logic model. After, we proceed with the verification which consists on testing conjectures upon the logic models. The results collected with those tests allow the extraction of facts about our set of protocols. In a last instance, such facts are the evidence of the protocol's resistance to well-known attack patterns. In order to provide a broader view of the subject of security protocol verification, this work also reviews all the available methods. Not limiting to those already used in this study. In addition, every piece of material related to the formal modelling and respective proofs is included as appendices

Logics for Cryptographic Protocols - Virtues and Limitations

In this note we offer a perspective on the virtues and limitations of several logics for cryptographic protocols focusing primarily on the logics of authentication. We emphasize the scope limitations of these logics rather than their virtues because (1) we consider their virtues to be better understood and accepted than their limitations, and (2) we hope to stimulate further research that will expand their scope. 1 Introduction Advances in the formal analysis of authentication protocols, based primarily on the logic of authentication of Burrows, Abadi, and Needham [2,4], have stimulated interest in the development of new logics for analysis of other aspects of cryptographic protocols, such as message-meaning recognition [9,10] and message secrecy or privacy [6], not just for authentication. The use of these logics can be hampered, to some extent, by the difficulty of delimiting their usefulness in practical applications. The limited application scope of these logics can be easily misu..