Secure Communication using Identity Based Encryption

Secured communication has been widely deployed to guarantee confidentiality and\ud integrity of connections over untrusted networks, e.g., the Internet. Although\ud secure connections are designed to prevent attacks on the connection, they hide\ud attacks inside the channel from being analyzed by Intrusion Detection Systems\ud (IDS). Furthermore, secure connections require a certain key exchange at the\ud initialization phase, which is prone to Man-In-The-Middle (MITM) attacks. In this paper, we present a new method to secure connection which enables Intrusion Detection and overcomes the problem of MITM attacks. We propose to apply Identity Based Encryption (IBE) to secure a communication channel. The key escrow property of IBE is used to recover the decryption key, decrypt network traffic on the fly, and scan for malicious content. As the public key can be generated based on the identity of the connected server and its exchange is not necessary, MITM attacks are not easy to be carried out any more. A prototype of a modified TLS scheme is implemented and proved with a simple client-server application. Based on this prototype, a new IDS sensor is developed to be capable of identifying IBE encrypted secure traffic on the fly. A deployment architecture of the IBE sensor in a company network is proposed. Finally, we show the applicability by a practical experiment and some preliminary performance measurements

Some Implementation Issues for Security Services based on IBE

Identity Based Encryption (IBE) is a public key cryptosystem where a unique identity string, such as an e-mail address, can be used as a public key. IBE is simpler than the traditional PKI since certificates are not needed. An IBE scheme is usually based on pairing of discrete points on elliptic curves. An IBE scheme can also be based on quadratic residuosity. This paper presents an overview of these IBE schemes and surveys present IBE based security services. Private key management is described in detail with protocols to authenticate users of Private Key Generation Authorities (PKG), to protect submission of generated private keys, and to avoid the key escrow problem. In the security service survey IBE implementations for smartcards, for smart phones, for security services in mobile networking, for security services in health care information systems, for secure web services, and for grid network security are presented. Also the performance of IBE schemes is estimated

Securing Communication in the IoT-based Health Care Systems

Rapid development of Internet of Things (IoT) and its whole ecosystems are opening a lot of opportunities that can improve humans' quality of life in many aspects. One of the promising area where IoT can enhance our life is in the health care sector. However, security and privacy becomes the main concern in the electronic Health (eHealth) systems and it becomes more challenging with the integration of IoT. Furthermore, most of the IoT-based health care system architecture is designed to be cross-organizational due to many different stakeholders in its overall ecosystems – thus increasing the security complexity. There are several aspects of security in the IoT-based health care system, among them are key management, authentication and encryption/decryption to ensure secure communication and access to health sensing information. This paper introduces a key management method that includes mutual authentication and secret key agreement to establish secure communication between any IoT health device with any entity from different organization or domain through Identity-Based Cryptography (IBC)

Building Trust Networks

The common agreement in the industry is that the Public Key Infrastructure is complex and expensive. From the year 1976 with the introduction of public key cryptography and the introduction of PKI concept in 1977 a lot of scientific resources has been spent on creation of usable key exchange systems and concepts to build trust networks. Most EU Member States have implemented their own national Public Key Infrastructure solutions mainly to enable strong authentication of citizens. They are however not the only systems within the EU to utilize PKI. Due to the nature of the PKI it is most convenient or suitable in an environment with stakeholders with similar agendas. This has resulted in several new PKI developments for specific purposes, within one industry or one vertical such as healthcare. Some Member States have tried to incorporate vertical needs with an all-purpose PKI solution, such as the Austrian eID card with so called sector specific certificates (http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/4486/5584). From the CIA (Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability) triangle public key cryptography provides confidentiality and integrity. The modern world however has more requirements in environments where sensitive information is being exchanged. It is not enough to know identity of the entity trying to access the information, but to also know the entity permissions or privileges regarding the requested resource. The authorization process grants the user specific permissions to e.g. access, modify or delete resources. A pure PKI does not allow us to build complex authorization policies, and therefore some of the Member States have built (authentication and) authorization solutions on top of existing authentication infrastructures, especially in the eGovernment sector. The scientific community has also tried to solve this issue by creating extensions to the basic PKI concept, and some of these concepts have been successful. Another problem with large scales systems is the key distribution. Managing a large number of keys using a central solution such as PKI has proven to be problematic in certain conditions. Either there are tradeoffs in security, or problems with application support. The last issue deals with public key cryptography itself. Current cryptography relies on the fact that it provides enough security based on availability of the resources, i.e. computational power. New approaches have been introduced both scientifically and commercially by moving away from the mathematics to other areas such as quantum mechanics. This paper is a quick review on some of the existing systems and their benefits and inherent challenges as well as a short introduction to new developments in the areas of authentication, authorization and key distribution.JRC.G.6-Security technology assessmen

A systematic literature review of cloud computing in eHealth

Cloud computing in eHealth is an emerging area for only few years. There needs to identify the state of the art and pinpoint challenges and possible directions for researchers and applications developers. Based on this need, we have conducted a systematic review of cloud computing in eHealth. We searched ACM Digital Library, IEEE Xplore, Inspec, ISI Web of Science and Springer as well as relevant open-access journals for relevant articles. A total of 237 studies were first searched, of which 44 papers met the Include Criteria. The studies identified three types of studied areas about cloud computing in eHealth, namely (1) cloud-based eHealth framework design (n=13); (2) applications of cloud computing (n=17); and (3) security or privacy control mechanisms of healthcare data in the cloud (n=14). Most of the studies in the review were about designs and concept-proof. Only very few studies have evaluated their research in the real world, which may indicate that the application of cloud computing in eHealth is still very immature. However, our presented review could pinpoint that a hybrid cloud platform with mixed access control and security protection mechanisms will be a main research area for developing citizen centred home-based healthcare applications

Insecure by Design: Protocols for Encrypted Phone Calls

It is increasingly clear that existing phone security mechanisms are inadequate and that change is necessary. Instead of protecting phone conversations from eavesdropping, the UK government's proposed voice encryption standard appears to be designed to facilitate undetectable mass surveillance

A New Method IBE Interfaced with Private Key Generation and Public Key Infrastructure to Achieve High Data Security

A New Method IBE Interfaced with Private Key Generation and Public Key Infrastructure to Achieve High Data Securit