Group Security Authentication and Key Agreement Protocol Built by Elliptic Curve Diffie Hellman Key Exchange for LTE Military Grade Communication

Abstract

4G mobile communication is a global technology. Therefore, it is essential to enforce confidentiality between mobile users and their networks. This paper presents a Group Security Authentication and Key Agreement Protocol Built by Elliptic Curve Diffie Hellman Key Exchange (GSAKA-ECDHKE) to overcome and address the LTE networks Evolved Packet System Authentication and Key Agreement Protocol (EPS-AKA) protocol flaws and vulnerabilities. GSAKA-ECDHKE is presented for 4G mobile military group communications to provide security, confidentiality, and privacy while the users and networks authenticate. By embedding the Group Commander (GC) role in the EPS-AKA protocol to control the member authentication in the group. GSAKA-ECDHKE protocol is based on Elliptic Curve Diffie Hellman Key Exchange (ECDHKE) and hash function to generate and share secret Elliptic Curve (EC) key to encrypt and protect the routing authentication parameters. The Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications (AVISPA) tool is used for security analysis and formal verification. AVISPA demonstrated that GSAKA-ECDHKE had overcome various known security attacks such as Man In The Middle (MITM), replay attacks, and Denial of Services (DoS) attacks, satisfying the evaluated security requirements. Additionally, the suggested protocol provides the lowest communication overheads compared to the existing group-based AKA protocols.