A Multi-service Group Key Management Scheme for Stateless Receivers in Wireless Mesh Networks

Wireless mesh networks facilitate the development of the many group oriented applications by extending the coverage area of the group communication. Group communication in a wireless mesh network is complicated due to dynamic intermediate mesh points, access control for communications between different administrative domains, and the absence of a centralized network controller. In this study, we propose a topology-matching decentralized multi-service group key management scheme for wireless mesh networks. It allows service providers to update and deliver their group keys to valid members in a distributed manner using the identity-based encryption scheme. The analysis result indicates that the proposed scheme has advantages with regard to the rekeying cost and storage overhead for a member and a mesh point in multi-sender group communication environments. The stateless property is also achieved such that a stateless member, who could not be constantly online, can easily decrypt the rekeying messages without recording the past history of transmission.