A lightweight anonymous authentication scheme for consumer roaming in ubiquitous networks with provable security

Ubiquitous networks provide roaming service for mobile nodes enabling them to use the services extended by their home networks in a foreign network. A mutual authentication scheme between the roamed mobile node and the foreign network is needed to be performed through the home network. Various authentication schemes have been developed for such networks, but most of them failed to achieve security in parallel to computational efficiency. Recently, Shin et al. and Wen et al. separately proposed two efficient authentication schemes for roaming service in ubiquitous networks. Both argued their schemes to satisfy all the security requirements for such systems. However, in this paper, we show that Shin et al. 's scheme is susceptible to: (i) user traceability; (ii) user impersonation; (iii) service provider impersonation attacks; and (iv) session key disclosure. Furthermore, we show that Wen et al. 's scheme is also insecure against: (i) session key disclosure; and (ii) known session key attacks. To conquer the security problems, we propose an improved authentication scheme with anonymity for consumer roaming in ubiquitous networks. The proposed scheme not only improved the security but also retained a lower computational cost as compared with existing schemes. We prove the security of proposed scheme in random oracle model. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An anonymous biometric‐based remote user‐authenticated key agreement scheme for multimedia systems

We analyze the security of the Li et al . authentication scheme and show its vulnerability to off‐line password‐guessing and replay attacks. We design a new anonymous authentication scheme. The proposed scheme not only removes the drawback of the scheme of the Li et al . scheme but also protects user's anonymity. Moreover, we show validity of our proposed scheme using Burrows, Abadi, and Needham logic. Our scheme is comparable in terms of the communication and computational overhead with related schemes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An anonymous and untraceable password‐based authentication scheme for session initiation protocol using smart cards

Recently, Zhang et al. proposed a password‐based authenticated key agreement for session initiation protocol (Int J Commun Syst 2013, doi:10.1002/dac.2499). They claimed that their protocol is secure against known security attacks. However, in this paper, we indicate that the protocol by Zhang et al. is vulnerable to impersonation attack whereby an active adversary without knowing the user's password is able to introduce himself/herself as the user. In addition, we show that the protocol by Zhang et al. suffers from password changing attack. To overcome the weaknesses, we propose an improved authentication scheme for session initiation protocol. The rigorous analysis shows that our scheme achieves more security than the scheme by Zhang et al. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cryptanalysis and improvement of ‘a robust smart‐card‐based remote user password authentication scheme’

With the use of smart card in user authentication mechanisms, the concept of two‐factor authentication came into existence. This was a forward move towards more secure and reliable user authentication systems. It elevated the security level by requiring a user to possess something in addition to know something. In 2010, Sood et al. and Song independently examined a smart‐card‐based authentication scheme proposed by Xu et al. They showed that in the scheme of Xu et al., an internal user of the system can turn hostile to impersonate other users of the system. Both of them also proposed schemes to improve the scheme of Xu et al. Recently, Chen et al. identified some security problems in the improved schemes proposed by Sood et al. and Song. To fix these problems, Chen et al. presented another scheme, which they claimed to provide mutual authentication and withstand lost smart card attack. Undoubtedly, in their scheme, a user can also verify the legitimacy of server, but we find that the scheme fails to resist impersonation attacks and privileged insider attack. We also show that the scheme does not provide important features such as user anonymity, confidentiality to air messages, and revocation of lost/stolen smart card. Besides, the scheme defies the very purpose of two‐factor security. Furthermore, an attacker can guess a user's password from his or her lost/stolen smart card. To meet these challenges, we propose a user authentication method with user anonymity. We show through analysis and comparison that the proposed scheme exhibits enhanced efficiency in contrast to related schemes, including the scheme of Chen et al. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An improved password‐based authentication scheme for session initiation protocol using smart cards without verification table

Authentication schemes have been widely deployed access control and mobility management in various communication networks. Especially, the schemes that are based on multifactor authentication such as on password and smart card come to be more practical. One of the standard authentication schemes that have been widely used for secure communication over the Internet is session initiation protocol (SIP). The original authentication scheme proposed for SIP was vulnerable to some crucial security weaknesses. To overcome the security problems, various improved authentication schemes have been developed, especially based on elliptic curve cryptography (ECC). Very recently, Zhang et al . proposed an improved authentication scheme for SIP based on ECC using smart cards to overcome the security flaws of the related protocols. Zhang et al . claimed that their protocol is secure against all known security attacks. However, this paper indicates that Zhang et al . protocol is still insecure against impersonation attack. We show that an active attacker can easily masquerade as a legal server to fool users. As a remedy, we also improve Zhang et al . protocol by imposing a little extra computation cost. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A secure and effective biometric‐based user authentication scheme for wireless sensor networks using smart card and fuzzy extractor

User authentication is a prominent security requirement in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) for accessing the real‐time data from the sensors directly by a legitimate user (external party). Several user authentication schemes are proposed in the literature. However, most of them are either vulnerable to different known attacks or they are inefficient. Recently, Althobaiti et al. presented a biometric‐based user authentication scheme for WSNs. Although their scheme is efficient in computation, in this paper, we first show that their scheme has several security pitfalls such as (i) it is not resilient against node capture attack; (ii) it is insecure against impersonation attack; and (iii) it is insecure against man‐in‐the‐middle attack. We then aim to propose a novel biometric‐based user authentication scheme suitable for WSNs in order to withstand the security pitfalls found in Althobaiti et al. scheme. We show through the rigorous security analysis that our scheme is secure and satisfies the desirable security requirements. Furthermore, the simulation results for the formal security verification using the most widely used and accepted Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications tool indicate that our scheme is secure. Our scheme is also efficient compared with existing related schemes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cryptanalysis of a dynamic ID‐based remote user authentication with key agreement scheme

A dynamic user authentication scheme allows a user and a remote server to authenticate each other without leaking the user's identity. In 2011, Wen and Li proposed an improved dynamic ID‐based remote user authentication with key agreement scheme for mobile and home networks. They claimed that their scheme was more secure than the scheme of Wang et al. However, we demonstrate that their scheme is vulnerable to the privileged insider, off‐line password guessing, impersonation, and server spoofing attacks. At the same time, it does not provide any user anonymity and forward secrecy property. Thus, it is not feasible for real‐life implementation.Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Design of a user anonymous password authentication scheme without smart card

Recently, Jiang et al. and He et al. independently found security problems in Chen et al.'s remote user authentication scheme for non‐tamper‐proof storage devices like Universal Serial Bus stick and proposed improvements. Nonetheless, we detect that the schemes proposed by Jiang et al. and He et al. overlook a user's privacy. We also observe that Jiang et al.'s scheme is vulnerable to insider attack and denial of service attacks and lacks forward secrecy. We point out that the password changing facility in He et al.'s scheme is equivalent to undergoing registration, whereas in Jiang et al.'s scheme, it is unsuitable. Moreover, the login phase of both the schemes is incapable to prevent the use of wrong password leading to the computation of an unworkable login request. Therefore, we design a new scheme with user anonymity to surmount the identified weaknesses. Without adding much in communication/computational cost, our scheme provides more security characteristics and keeps the merits of the original schemes. As compared with its predecessor schemes, the proposed scheme stands out as a more apt user authentication method for common storage devices. We have also presented a formal proof of security of the proposed scheme based on the logic proposed by Burrows, Abadi and Needham (BAN logic). Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cryptanalysis and security enhancement of a robust two‐factor authentication and key agreement protocol

Two‐factor user authentication scheme allows a user to use a smart card and a password to achieve mutual authentication and establish a session key between a server and a user. In 2012, Chen et al. showed that the scheme of Sood et al. does not achieve mutual authentication and is vulnerable to off‐line password guessing and smart card stolen attacks. They also found that another scheme proposed by Song is vulnerable to similar off‐line password guessing and smart card stolen attacks. They further proposed an improved scheme. In this paper, we first show that the improved scheme of Chen et al. still suffers from off‐line password guessing and smart card stolen attacks, does not support perfect forward secrecy, and lacks the fairness of session key establishment. We then propose a new security‐enhanced scheme and show its security and authentication using the formal verification tool ProVerif, which is based on applied pi calculus. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Design and analysis of an improved smartcard‐based remote user password authentication scheme

With the fast development of the Internet and the telecommunication technologies, internet users are carrying out various electronic transactions over internet by means of the authentication protocols. To ensure efficient and robust online transaction, security of authentication protocol turns out to be a great concern nowadays. As a result, smartcard‐based password authentication and session key agreement scheme receives significant attention in recent years. In the literature, various authentication schemes have been proposed by the cryptographic research community. Recently, Li et al. analyze some security weaknesses of the authentication scheme of Chen et al. and propose an enhancement based on the discrete logarithm problem and computational Diffie–Hellman problem. This paper further cryptanalyzes the scheme of Li et al. and identifies various security loopholes and then constructs a modified authentication scheme as a remedy. The security and efficiency evaluations demonstrate that our scheme has more security features and low computation costs than the related schemes. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A secure and efficient identity‐based mutual authentication scheme with smart card using elliptic curve cryptography

The e‐commerce has got great development in the past decades and brings great convenience to people. Users can obtain all kinds of services through e‐commerce platform with mobile device from anywhere and at anytime. To make it work well, e‐commerce platform must be secure and provide privacy preserving. To achieve this goal, Islam et al. proposed a dynamic identity‐based remote user mutual authentication scheme with smart card using Elliptic Curve Cryptography(ECC). Islam et al claimed that the security of their scheme was good enough to resist various attacks. However, we demonstrate that their scheme is vulnerable to insider attack and suffers from off‐line password guessing attack if smart card is compromised. To overcome the deficiencies, we present an improved scheme over Islam's scheme. The security proof and analysis shows that our scheme can also provide user anonymity and mutual authentication, and the security is enough to against relay attack, impersonation attack, and other common secure attackers. The performance analysis shows that the proposed scheme is more efficient than Islam et al's scheme.     

Anonymous authentication protocol based on elliptic curve Diffie–Hellman for wireless access networks

Anonymous channel tickets have been proposed as a way to provide user anonymity and to reduce the overhead of re‐authentication for authentication in wireless environments. Chen et al. proposed a secure and efficient protocol, based on a protocol proposed by Yang et al., which is resistant to guessing attacks on networks from which users’ secret keys are easy to obtain. However, their scheme is time‐consuming in the phases of ticket issuing and authentication. Furthermore, a malicious attacker can utilize the expired time, T_exp, to launch a denial of authentication (DoA) attack, which is a type of denial of service attack. Because T_exp is exposed to any user, it would be easy to launch a DoA attack that could make the scheme impractical. To resist against DoAs that the scheme of Chen et al. might suffer, we propose an improved scheme based on elliptic curve cryptography in this paper. Our scheme not only reduces time cost but also enhances security. The basis of the proposed scheme is the elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem. The operations of points of an elliptic curve are faster and use fewer bits to achieve the same level of security. Therefore, our scheme is more suitable for mobile devices, which have limited computing power and storage. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A secure and enhanced elliptic curve cryptography‐based dynamic authentication scheme using smart card

In remote system security, 2‐factor authentication is one of the security approaches and provides fundamental protection to the system. Recently, numerous 2‐factor authentication schemes are proposed. In 2014, Troung et al proposed an enhanced dynamic authentication scheme using smart card mainly to provide anonymity, secure mutual authentication, and session key security. By the analysis of Troung et al's scheme, we observed that Troung et al' s scheme does not provide user anonymity, perfect forward secrecy, server's secret key security and does not allow the user to choose his/her password. We also identified that Troung et al's scheme is vulnerable to replay attack. To fix these security weaknesses, a robust authentication scheme is proposed and analyzed using the formal verification tool for measuring the robustness. From the observation of computational efficiency of the proposed scheme, we conclude that the scheme is more secure and easy to implement practically.     

A practical authentication protocol with anonymity for wireless access networks

The use of anonymous channel tickets was proposed for authentication in wireless environments to provide user anonymity and to probably reduce the overhead of re‐authentications. Recently, Yang et al. proposed a secure and efficient authentication protocol for anonymous channel in wireless systems without employing asymmetric cryptosystems. In this paper, we will show that Yang et al.'s scheme is vulnerable to guessing attacks performed by malicious visited networks, which can easily obtain the secret keys of the users. We propose a new practical authentication scheme not only reserving the merits of Yang et al.'s scheme, but also extending some additional merits including: no verification table in the home network, free of time synchronization between mobile stations and visited networks, and without obsolete anonymous tickets left in visited networks. The proposed scheme is developed based on a secure one‐way hash function and simple operations, a feature which is extremely fit for mobile devices. We provide the soundness of the authentication protocol by using VO logic. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An efficient three factor–based authentication scheme in multiserver environment using ECC

Recently, Li et al have developed a smartcard‐based remote user authentication scheme in multiserver environment. They have claimed that their scheme is secured against some possible cryptographic attacks. However, we have analyzed that the scheme of Li et al cannot preserve all the proclaimed security goals, which are given as follows: (1) It is not withstanding password‐guessing, user impersonation, insider, and smartcard theft attacks, and (2) it fails to facilitate user anonymity property. To remedy these above‐mentioned security flaws, we have proposed an efficient three factor–based authentication scheme in a multiserver environment using elliptic curve cryptography. The Burrows‐Abadi‐Needham logic is used to confirm the security validation of our scheme, which ensures that it provides mutual‐authentication and session‐key agreement securely. Then, the random oracle model is also considered to analyze the proposed scheme, and it shows that the backbone parameters, ie, identity, password, biometrics, and the session key, are secure from an adversary. Further, the informal security analysis confirms that the suggested scheme can withstand against some possible mentioned attacks. Later, the Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications tool is incorporated to ensure its security against passive and active attacks. Finally, the performance comparison of the scheme is furnished to confirm its enhanced security with other relevant schemes.     

An enhanced authentication with key agreement scheme for satellite communication systems

To ensure secure communication in satellite communication systems, recently, Zhang et al presented an authentication with key agreement scheme and claimed that their scheme satisfies various security requirements. However, this paper demonstrates that Zhang et al's scheme is insecure against the stolen‐verifier attack and the denial of service attack. Furthermore, to authenticate a user, Zhang et al's scheme requires large computational load to exhaustively retrieve the user's identity and password from the account database according to a temporary identity and then update the temporary identity in the database. To overcome the weaknesses existing in Zhang et al's scheme, we proposed an enhanced authentication with key agreement scheme for satellite communication systems. The analyses of our proposed scheme show that the proposed scheme possesses perfect security properties and eliminates the weaknesses of Zhang et al's scheme well. Therefore, from the authors' viewpoints, the proposed scheme is more suitable for the authentication scheme of mobile satellite communication systems.     

Improvement of robust smart‐card‐based password authentication scheme

Smart‐card‐based password authentication scheme is one of the commonly used mechanisms to prevent unauthorized service and resource access and to remove the potential security threats over the insecure networks and has been investigated extensively in the last decade. Recently, Chen et al. proposed a smart‐card‐based password authentication scheme and claimed that the scheme can withstand offline password guessing attacks even if the information stored in the smart card is extracted by the adversary. However, we observe that the scheme of Chen et al. is insecure against offline password guessing attacks in this case. To remedy this security problem, we propose an improved authentication protocol, which inherits the merits of the scheme of Chen et al. and is free from the security flaw of their scheme. Compared with the previous schemes, our improved scheme provides more security guarantees while keeping efficiency. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Robust smart‐card‐based remote user password authentication scheme

Smart‐card‐based remote user password authentication schemes are commonly used for providing authorized users a secure method for remotely accessing resources over insecure networks. In 2009, Xu et al. proposed a smart‐card‐based password authentication scheme. They claimed their scheme can withstand attacks when the information stored on the smart card is disclosed. Recently, Sood et al. and Song discovered that the smart‐card‐based password authentication scheme of Xu et al. is vulnerable to impersonation and internal attacks. They then proposed their respective improved schemes. However, we found that there are still flaws in their schemes: the scheme of Sood et al. does not achieve mutual authentication and the secret key in the login phase of Song's scheme is permanent and thus vulnerable to stolen‐smart‐card and off‐line guessing attacks. In this paper, we will propose an improved and efficient smart‐card‐based password authentication and key agreement scheme. According to our analysis, the proposed scheme not only maintains the original secret requirement but also achieves mutual authentication and withstands the stolen‐smart‐card attack. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

基于动态ID远程用户身份认证方案的改进

对Wang提出的动态ID远程用户身份认证方案进行了回顾和分析,指出了Wang方案中存在不能保护用户匿名和不能抗拒绝服务攻击的缺陷。针对此缺陷,在保留原方案优点的基础上提出了一种改进的动态ID远程用户身份认证方案,并通过对比分析说明了改进方案的安全性和有效性。