Hierarchical Tree Structure Based Clustering Schemes for Secure Group Communication

Abstract

In recent years, many network applications are developed based on group communications (GC), in which the security has to be provided in terms of confidentiality, authenticity and integrity of messages delivered between the group members. A Hierarchical tree structure has to be constructed in such a way that it can handle large dynamic groups with the effective key formation and key distribution. In this paper, an Optimal Cluster Hierarchical Tree (OCHT) structure is presented for effective group communication. The proposed OCHT structure provides a novel solution for multicast key management with decentralized architecture to ensure scalability, reliability and cost effectiveness. Simulation results reveal that proposed OCHT based decentralized architectures provide better performance when compared with existing Logical Hierarchical Tree (LKH). The parameters used for simulation are Memory Overhead, Throughput, Packet Delivery Ratio, End-to-End Latency and Energy consumption.