1-Round Distributed Key Generation With Efficient Reconstruction Using Decentralized CP-ABE

A Distributed Key Generation (DKG) protocol is an essential component of threshold cryptosystems required to initialize the cryptosystem securely and generate its private and public keys. In the case of discrete-log-based (dlog-based) threshold signature schemes (ElGamal and its derivatives), the DKG protocol is further used in the distributed signature generation phase to generate one-time signature randomizers (r = gk). In this paper we show that a widely used dlog-based DKG protocol suggested by Pedersen does not guarantee a uniformly random distribution of generated keys: we describe an efficient active attacker controlling a small number of parties which successfully biases the values of the generated keys away from uniform. We then present a new DKG protocol for the setting of dlog-based cryptosystems which we prove to satisfy the security requirements from DKG protocols and, in particular, it ensures a uniform distribution of the generated keys. The new protocol can be used as a secure replacement for the many applications of Pedersen's protocol. Motivated by the fact that the new DKG protocol incurs additional communication cost relative to Pedersen's original protocol, we investigate whether the latter can be used in specific applications which require relaxed security properties from the DKG protocol. We answer this question affirmatively by showing that Pedersen's protocol suffices for the secure implementation of certain threshold cryptosystems whose security can be reduced to the hardness of the discrete logarithm problem. In particular, we show Pedersen's DKG to be sufficient for the construction of a threshold Schnorr signature scheme. Finally, we observe an interesting trade-off between security (reductions), computation, and communication that arises when comparing Pedersen's DKG protocol with ours.

Lattice-based Attribute-based encryption is a well-known cryptographic mechanism that can resist quantum attacks and has the ability of fine-grained access control, and it has a wide range of application scenarios in current Internet of Thing (IoT) era. However, lack of efficiency and existing the problem of large ciphertext expansion rate are the main disadvantages impede the applications of this mechanism. Thus, we propose an efficient and practical ciphertext policy attribute-based encryption (CP-ABE) scheme from lattices in the paper. In this scheme, to make the secret key reusable, we adjust access tree and propose a basic access tree structure, which can be converted from disjunctive normal form, and combine it with a light post-quantum scheme of Kyber. In addition, the compression method and plaintext expansion method are introduced to optimize the scheme. Our CP-ABE scheme is secure against chosen plaintext attack under the hardness of module learning with errors problem. We implement our scheme and compare it with three recent related schemes in terms of security, function and communication cost. Experiments and comparisons show that our CP-ABE scheme has advantages in high encryption efficiency, small matrix dimension, small key sizes, and low ciphertext expansion rate, which has some merit in practice.

Pairing-based CP-ABE with constant-size ciphertexts and secret keys for cloud environment

A Distributed Key Generation (DKG)p rotocol is an essential component of any threshold cryptosystem. It is used to initialize the cryptosystem and generate its private and public keys, and it is used as a subprotocol, for example to generate a one-time key pair which is a part of any threshold El-Gamal-like signature scheme. Gennaro et al. showed [GJKR99] that a widely-known non-interactive DKG protocol suggested by Pedersen does not guarantee a uniformly random distribution of generated secret keys even in the static adversary model. Furthermore, Gennaro et al. proposed to replace this protocol with one that guarantees a uniform distribution of the generated key but requires an extra round of reliable broadcast communication.We investigate the question whether some discrete-log based threshold cryptosystems remain secure when implemented using the more efficient DKG protocol of Pedersen, in spite of the fact that the adversary can skew the distribution of the secret key generated by this protocol. We answer this question in the positive. We show that threshold versions of some schemes whose security reduces to the hardness of the discrete logarithm problem, remain secure when implemented with Pedersen DKG. We exemplify this claim with a threshold Schnorr signature scheme.However, the resulting scheme has less efficient security reduction (in the random oracle model)from the hardness of the discrete logarithm problem than the same scheme implemented with the computationally more expensive DKG protocol of Gennaro et al. Thus our results imply a trade-o. in the design of threshold versions of certain discrete-log based schemes between the round complexity of a protocol and the size of the modulus.KeywordsThreshold cryptographydistributed key generationdiscrete logarithmexact securityrandom oracle model

Nowadays, many organizations are adopting cloud computing for storing the large amount of organization’s important and private data. Here, it becomes important to mange appropriate access rights to these data as it is stored outside the organization’s boundary and is handled by the third party service providers. The Ciphertext Policy Attribute-based Encryption (CPABE) scheme is the most widely utilized technique that offers encrypted access control. In the existing implementations of CPABE scheme, one of the significant issues that need to be addressed is an efficient revocation mechanism. In this paper a direct and immediate user revocation approach for CPABE scheme is presented. The proposed method offers direct user revocation by maintaining the revocation list and to keep revocation list smaller the validity time is embedded in the user’s secret key. The revoked users are still able to access the previously generated ciphertexts. Hence, ciphertext update process is incorporated and a separate immediate revocation list is maintained so that the revoked users’ access is restricted. Also, in the proposed system the revocation information is embedded in ciphertext as a separate part so the update process of ciphertext is more efficient.KeywordsAttributesRevocationABECPABERevocation listValidity periodCloudAccess structure

A Review on Data Privacy using Attribute-Based Encryption

Attribute-based encryption (ABE) for cloud computing access control is reviewed in this article. A taxonomy and comprehensive assessment criteria of ABE are first proposed. In the taxonomy, ABE schemes are assorted into key-policy ABE (KP-ABE) schemes, ciphertext-policy ABE (CP-ABE) schemes, anti-quantum ABE schemes, and generic constructions. In accordance with cryptographically functional features, CP-ABE is further divided into nine subcategories with regard to basic functionality, revocation, accountability, policy hiding, policy updating, multi-authority, hierarchy, offline computation, and outsourced computation. In addition, a systematical methodology for discussing and comparing existing ABE schemes is proposed. For KP-ABE and each type of CP-ABE, the corresponding access control scenario is presented and explained by concrete examples. Specifically, the syntax of ABE is given followed by the adversarial model and security goals. ABE schemes are discussed according to the design strategies and special features and are compared in the light of the proposed assessment criteria with respect to security and performance. Compared to related state-of-the-art survey papers, this article not only provides a broader 12 categories of ABE schemes, but also makes a more comprehensive and holistic comparison. Finally, a number of open research challenges in ABE are pointed out.

In this work, an oblivious transfer with complex access control scheme that is constructed based on ciphertext policy attribute based encryption (CP-ABE) scheme is proposed. In this scheme, the database server can enforce fine grained access control for each record where the authorized user is allowed to access, but the unauthorized user cannot, whereas it learns neither which record a user accesses, nor which attributes a user has. This scheme has the advantages as follows: First, it allows the expressive access control policies where access structures are based on linear secret sharing scheme that directly supports AND, OR and Threshold gates. Second, the communication complexity in this scheme is constant in the numbers of records which have been accessed. Third, this scheme is constructed in prime order bilinear group. Fourth, this scheme is secure in the standard model. To the best of our knowledge, this scheme is the first to obtain these features simultaneously.

Attribute-based encryption schemes with constant-size ciphertexts

Cipher text-Policy Attribute Based Encryption (CP-ABE) is a promising cryptographic primitive for fine-grained access control of shared data. However, when CP-ABE is used to control outsourced data sharing, it confronts two obstacles. Firstly, the data owner must trust the attributes authority, secondly, the issue of attribute revocation of CP-ABE schemes, which suffers from such problems as different granularities of revocation, poor scalability and high computational complexity, is cumbersome. In this paper, we propose a new CP-ABE scheme that the data owners can fully control their outsourced shared data. We also resolve the issue of revocation including the entire user access privilege and just partial access right of the user, i.e., a subset of his/her attributes. Our proposed solution can achieve minimal overload by integrating CP-ABE with the access control of system. In addition, the data owners and the attributes authority can delegate most of laborious tasks to revocation proxy severs with the technique of proxy re-encryption. Finally, we present the quantitative test and analysis on the performance of our proposed scheme.

In a ciphertext-policy attribute-based encryption (CP-ABE) scheme, a user may have multiple attributes, and each attribute may be shared simultaneously by many users. The decryption key of an attribute can thus be shared by many users who all possess the attribute. For monetary gain, a malicious authorized user may reveal his/her decryption key to a third party, and it is difficult to trace the owner of primitive secret key from an exposed key. At the same time, this situation may also limit commercial applications of CP-ABE systems. To solve these problems and enable fine-grained access control for the encrypted data, we propose a traceable CP-ABE scheme with attribute-level user revocation for cloud storage (TUR-CPABE). Our scheme enjoys four advantages. First, it has the ability to trace malicious users who have leaked key information from the system. Second, it supports attribute-level user revocation for malicious users and allows ABE fine-grained access control. Third, it allows secret key updates and ciphertext updates to resist collusion attacks between users. Fourth, outsourcing encryption, decryption and attribute revocation are used to reduce the computational burden on data owners, data users and the trust authority, respectively. In addition, our scheme has been proven to be secure against chosen plaintext attacks under a selective access policy based on decisional q – BDHE assumption in the standard model.

Electronic health record (EHR) stores not only the patient’s health-related data but also the sensitive individual information. Consequently, data security and access privacy are the greatest concern of EHR applications while sharing the data through the cloud. Ciphertext policy attribute-based encryption (CP-ABE) is one of the popular one-to-many encryption schemes, which helps to attain fine-grained access control in cloud domain. In CP-ABE, since the access policy is attached to the ciphertext, anyone with the ciphertext can see the data owner’s policy that may cause privacy leakage. In this paper, we proposed a CP-ABE cryptosystem that supports access policy obfuscation and outsourced decryption enabling efficient and secure operations in cloud environment. Linear secret sharing (LSS) scheme is used for supporting any monotonic access structures, thereby improving the access policy’s expressiveness. We have incorporated prime-order bilinear group and matrix-based LSS scheme that increases the computational efficiency of the cryptosystem. Finally, we have evaluated the performance of our CP-ABE cryptosystem using practical implementation utilizing Charm framework.

Although distributed key generation (DKG) has been studied for some time, it has never been examined outside of the synchronous setting. We present the first realistic DKG architecture for use over the Internet. We propose a practical system model and define an efficient verifiable secret sharing scheme in it. We observe the necessity of Byzantine agreement for asynchronous DKG and analyze the difficulty of using a randomized protocol for it. Using our verifiable secret sharing scheme and a leader-based agreement protocol, we then design a DKG protocol for public-key cryptography. Finally, along with traditional proactive security, we also introduce group modification primitives in our system.

In order to solve the problem that all participants in the secret sharing scheme constructed by the linear code may be malicious, we use Shoemakers' PVSS (Publicly Verifiable Secret Sharing) model to construct a PVSS Scheme. This scheme using general access structure which makes different people have different rights in the sharing scheme. Furthermore, private channels are not required between the dealer and the participants, and the non-interactive scheme can be publicly verified.

To ensure the security of mass data sharing in the Internet of Things, the cloud computing platform is supposed to provide data-storage services. The ciphertext-policy attribute-based encryption (CP-ABE) schemes has attracted wide-scale attention since users can access the cloud platform in a fine-grained manner. However, there are still some problems in the existing CP-ABE schemes when directly applied in the Internet of Things environment. The problem of simultaneously achieves large computational cost in the encryption and decryption. Moreover, the privacy of access control policy actually still remains unresolved. To fill the gap of the existing schemes, this paper proposes a suitable data sharing scheme for IoT devices which can’t always be online. We use the online/offline CP-ABE technology with privacy, while hiding the access control structure and reducing the computational cost of the devices when they are online. The asymptotic complexity comparison also shows that our scheme achieves high computation efficiency.