Privacy-preserving PKI design based on group signature

Abstract

Nowadays, Internet becomes a part of our life. We can make use of numerous services with personal computer, lap-top, tablet, smart phone or smart TV. These devices with network make us enjoy ubiquitous computing life. Sometimes, on-line services request us authentication or identification for access control and authorization, and PKI technology is widely used because of its security. However the possibility of privacy invasion will increase, if we’re identified with same certificate in many services and these identification data are accumulated. For privacy-preserving authentication or anonymous authentication, there have been many researches such as group signatures, anonymous credentials, etc. Among these researches, group signatures are very practical because they provide unlinkability and traceability as well as anonymity. In this paper, we propose a privacy-preserving PKI based on group signature, with which users’ privacy can be kept in services. Because of traceability, their identities can be traced if they abuse anonymity such as cybercrime. Moreover, we will also discuss open issues for further studies.