Signature Authentication Research Articles

A New Handover Authentication Method for WiMAX Architecture

The Initial Network Entry Authentication (INEA) process is the first security entry between client and WiMAX network. WiMAX architecture provides a significant flexibility to respect wireless security requirements. The INEA framework is based on the Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) for user authentication and key management. However, EAP authentication method introduces high authentication delay and signaling cost when the user moves between stations. These impact negatively the handover process and decrease the Quality of Service of WiMAX networks. In this paper, we analyze the existing INEA authentication process and we propose a new authentication method and key agreement for handovers process. To prove the new method validity, the verification is performed by using the formal security analyzer Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications which is a performed tool to find automatically potential attacks in security protocols. Furthermore, the proposed protocol is compared with other handover protocols. The comparison shows that proposed protocol outperforms the other protocols.

Spoofing detection, classification and cancelation (SDCC) receiver architecture for a moving GNSS receiver

Spoofing in the form of transmitting fake GNSS signals is a deliberate attack that aims to mislead GNSS receivers into generating false position/time solutions. Current work on GNSS spoofing has mainly focused on spoofing detection where the proposed algorithms only indicate the presence of spoofing attacks. A new architecture consisting of spoofing detection, authentic/spoofing signal classification and spoofing cancelation known as spoofing detection, classification and cancelation for moving GNSS receivers is proposed. Predespreading and acquisition level analysis are performed to detect the presence of spoofing interference. The receiver motion is then used to classify the signals tracked into two groups, namely spoofing and authentic signal sets. A successive spoofing cancelation method is then developed to remove the spoofing signals from the raw digitized samples. It is shown that canceling out the spoofing signals removes multiple access interference and significantly improves the authentic signals' detectability and tracking performance. Finally, after spoofing cancelation, authentic signals are acquired and tracked and their corresponding measurements are passed to a PVT engine for a reliable position solution. The proposed receiver architecture is analyzed in the acquisition, tracking and positioning layers.

Generation of aminoterminally truncated, stable types of bioactive bovine and porcine fibroblast growth factor 4 in Escherichia coli.

Fibroblast growth factor 4 (FGF4) is a crucial growth factor for the development of mammalian embryos. We previously produced hexahistidine-tagged, bovine and porcine FGF4 (Pro(32) to Leu(206) ) proteins without a secretory signal peptide at the aminoterminus in Escherichia coli. Here, we found that these were unstable; site-specific cleavage between Ser(54) and Leu(55) in both FGF4 derivatives was identified. In order to generate stable FGF4 derivatives and to investigate their biological activities, aminoterminally truncated and hexahistidine-tagged bovine and porcine FGF4 (Leu(55) to Leu(206) ) proteins, termed HisbFGF4L and HispFGF4L, respectively, were produced in E. coli. These FGF4 derivatives were sufficiently stable and exerted mitogenic activities in fibroblasts. Treatment with the FGF4 derivatives promoted the phosphorylation of ERK1/2, which are crucial kinases in the FGF signaling pathway. In the presence of PD173074, an FGF receptor inhibitor, the phosphorylation of ERK1/2 was inhibited and resulted in abolition of the growth-promoting activity of FGF4 derivatives. Taken together, we demonstrate that HisbFGF4L and HispFGF4L are capable of promoting the proliferation of bovine- and porcine-derived cells, respectively, via an authentic FGF signaling pathway. These FGF4 derivatives may be applicable for dissecting the roles of FGF4 during embryogenesis in cattle and pigs.

A Survey of Spoofing and Counter-Measures

The growing economic importance of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) makes it rewarding for malevolent people to aim at misleading receivers in their position and time estimation. This can be achieved by replacing or superposing signals to the authentic GNSS satellite signals and is called spoofing. Most current receivers are not designed to detect spoofing. The present article aims at a systematic exposition of threats. In many cases, they can be addressed by comparing the received signals, the estimated states, and their respective dynamics against models. A cryptographic signature of the navigation message would furthermore improve the detectability of fake synthetic signals, and should be implemented in the definition of new GNSS signals. In general, the analysis of spoofing should receive the same attention as the analysis of natural impairments. We hope that the present paper will contribute to achieve this.

Research of JMS Security Mechanism

According to the characteristics of the message middleware and JMS specification, this paper introduces several methods to improve the performance of the security of the JMS message middleware. The basic idea is to use two-way digital signature authentication information, and in the process of message transmission, to use negotiated session key and asymmetric encryption technology to encrypt messages. Using this mechanism can effectively protect the safety of the message transmission and storage, and to achieve a smaller time overhead associated with acceptable performance.

An Effective Authentication Method for Document Type Color Images with Data Repairing Capabilities

This is new authentication scheme based on the secret sharing method with a data repair capability for document type color images via the use of portable network graphics (PNG) image. And generate the authentication signals to each block of image, which together with the binarized block content, this authentication signals are transformed into a several shares using the secret sharing Scheme. The characters are carefully chosen from image so that many shares as possible are generated and embedded into an alpha channel plane. The alpha channel is combined with the original cover image to form a PNG image. While shares embedding process, the computed shares values are mapped into a range of alpha channel value near their maximum value of 255 to yield a transparent stego image. In the process of image authentication, the block in an image is marked as a tampered if the authentication signal computed from the current block content of a binary image does not match that extracted from the share embedded in the alpha channel plane. Data repair is applied to each tampered block after collecting two shares from unmarked block.

CPK-based login authentication for electricity operation information system

Login authentication security is indispensable to applications of client/server (C/S) structure. Although some security technology in login authentication is relatively mature after years of development, it cannot meet high security requirements for the system in the case of limited resources. To deal with it, this paper proposes a new login authentication solution and applies it in electricity operation information system (EOIS), an application aiming at electrical equipment overhaul and report. The authors firstly discuss the reason why combined public key (CPK) is adopted as the key technology instead of the common one public key infrastructure (PKI). Secondly, they expatiate on CPK generation mechanism and the realizing process of login authentication, including local authentication using CPK-based digital signature and remote authentication using web service. Then, some results from three encryption methods (message-digest algorithm 5(MD5), secure hash algorithm (SHA-1) and CPK-based digital signature) to test EOIS are given, which show that the new solution builds its security on Hash function chosen and protection of combined private key. Finally, the security analysis reveals that CPK-based login authentication is safer to ensure the certainty of user identity, the integrality and non-repudiation of messages, and the confidentiality of transmission.

Physical Layer Authentication for Mobile Systems with Time-Varying Carrier Frequency Offsets

A novel physical layer authentication scheme is proposed in this paper by exploiting the time-varying carrier frequency offset (CFO) associated with each pair of wireless communications devices. In realistic scenarios, radio frequency oscillators in each transmitter-and-receiver pair always present device-dependent biases to the nominal oscillating frequency. The combination of these biases and mobility-induced Doppler shift, characterized as a time-varying CFO, can be used as a radiometric signature for wireless device authentication. In the proposed authentication scheme, the variable CFO values at different communication times are first estimated. Kalman filtering is then employed to predict the current value by tracking the past CFO variation, which is modeled as an autoregressive random process. To achieve the proposed authentication, the current CFO estimate is compared with the Kalman predicted CFO using hypothesis testing to determine whether the signal has followed a consistent CFO pattern. An adaptive CFO variation threshold is derived for device discrimination according to the signal-to-noise ratio and the Kalman prediction error. In addition, a software-defined radio (SDR) based prototype platform has been developed to validate the feasibility of using CFO for authentication. Simulation results further confirm the effectiveness of the proposed scheme in multipath fading channels.

Topology control models and solutions for signal irregularity in mobile underwater wireless sensor networks

Underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) have been developed for a set of underwater applications, including resource exploration, pollution monitoring, and tactical surveillance. The topology control techniques of UWSNs and terrestrial wireless sensor networks are significantly different because of the particularity of underwater environments and acoustic communication. In underwater environments, signal irregularity phenomenon affecting network protocols is more prone to exhibit, and anchored sensor nodes towed by wires move within a spherical crown surface randomly. However, most previous efforts about topology control either have not been made on signal irregularity in mobile underwater wireless sensor networks, or the proposed irregularity models are too idealistic to reflect reality. The current study constructs a more authentic signal irregularity model, which can be degenerated into a variety of special cases easily, and three representative topology control objectives ((KS, β)-Coverage, (KC, α)-Connectivity, and efficient consumption) are concluded. A topology control algorithm for signal irregularity (TCASI) is designed for this topology control problem. The results prove the convergence of TCASI and polynomial complexity as well. The performance of the algorithm is analyzed through simulation experiments that indicate a well-constructed topology, where (KS, β)-Coverage and (KC, α)-Connectivity can be achieved while optimizing energy consumption as much as possible.

Pre-Despreading Authenticity Verification for GPS L1 C/A Signals

The performance of GNSS receivers can be highly affected by structural interference signals such as spoofing and meaconing. The structure and power level of these signals are very similar to those of the authentic GNSS signals and as such they cannot be easily detected in the received signal set. This paper proposes a low complexity authenticity verification technique that takes advantage of the GPS signal structure in order to detect the presence of undesired structural interferences in the received signal samples. The proposed technique operates on the raw signal samples and can detect the overpowered GPS spectrum prior to signal de-spreading. This method does not need any information regarding the AGC gain and operates on digitized signal samples only. The simulation results and real data processing verify the desired performance of the proposed method even when the received signal strength (RSS) of the spoofing and authentic signals are very close to each other. Copyright © 2014 Institute of Navigation.

Improved IPSec tunnel establishment for 3GPP–WLAN interworking

SummaryInterworking between wireless local area network (WLAN) and the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) such as Long Term Evolution (LTE) is facing more and more problems linked to security threats. Securing this interworking is a major challenge because of the vastly different architectures used within each network. Therefore, security is one of the major technical concerns in wireless networks that include measures such as authentication and encryption. Among the major challenges in the interworking security is the securing of the network layer. The goal of this article is twofold. First, we propose a new scheme to secure 3GPP LTE–WLAN interworking by the establishment of an improved IP Security tunnel between them. The proposed solution combines the Internet Key Exchange (IKEv2) with the Host Identity Protocol (HIP) to set up a security association based on two parameters, which are location and identity. Our novel scheme, which is called HIP_IKEv2, guarantees better security properties than each protocol used alone. Second, we benefit from Mobile Internet Key Exchange protocol (MOBIKE) in case of mobility events (handover). And we extend HIP_IKEv2 to HIP_MOBIKEv2 protocol in order to reduce the authentication signaling traffic. The proposed solution reinforces authentication, eliminates man‐in‐the‐middle attack, reduces denial‐of‐service attack, assures the integrity of messages, and secures against reply attack. Finally, our proposed solution has been modeled and verified using the Automated Validation of Internet Security Protocols and Applications and the Security Protocol Animator, which has proved its security when an intruder is present. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Implication of neutrino backgrounds on the reach of next generation dark matter direct detection experiments

As direct dark matter experiments continue to increase in size, they will become sensitive to neutrinos from astrophysical sources. For experiments that do not have directional sensitivity, coherent neutrino scattering (CNS) from several sources represents an important background to understand, as it can almost perfectly mimic an authentic WIMP signal. Here we explore in detail the effect of neutrino backgrounds on the discovery potential of WIMPs over the entire mass range of 500 MeV to 10 TeV. We show that, given the theoretical and measured uncertainties on the neutrino backgrounds, direct detection experiments lose sensitivity to light (~10 GeV) and heavy (~100 GeV) WIMPs with a spin-independent cross section below 10^{-45} cm^2 and 10^{-49} cm^2, respectively.

Authentication of animal signatures in traditional Chinese medicine of Lingyang Qingfei Wan using routine molecular diagnostic assays

Lingyang Qingfei Wan produced by Beijing TongRenTang is a long-standing and popular medicine in China and international pharmaceutical markets. Concerns continue to be raised about the legality of usage of saiga antelope, which was defined as endangered species by Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora legislation and internal legislation in China. Therefore, the alternative pill in which substitutes saiga antelope with goat in the formula of Lingyang Qingfei Wan was developed. In order to authenticate the origin of animal contents in Lingyang Qingfei Wan and its alternative pill, molecular diagnostic assay was utilized by mtDNA polymorphism analysis. Four universal primer pairs containing mtDNA 12SrRNA, 16SrRNA, cytochrome b gene and cytochrome oxidase I were employed to obtain species-specific sequences of saiga antelope and goat, and multiple species-specific primer pairs for saiga antelope and goat were used to identify the animal origin in patent pills according to nucleotide polymorphisms between the two species. In additions, alternative techniques were attempted surrounding dilemmas of low concentration of target DNAs and presence of PCR-inhibitory substances in organic ingredients within complex pill. Results revealed that all species-specific primers could be successfully used for authentication of animal origin within complex pill, and sample preprocessing was critical during experimental manipulation. Internal positive control was an efficient and cost-effective way to assist in monitoring the potential interference from inhibitory substances which existed in the highly processed pills.

Image Tampering Detection and Repairing

It is very crucial to design efficient methods to provide authentication to document images mainly for images whose security must be protected. In digital media the authentication, tampering detection and repairing of the tampered data is main concern. Nowadays many digital documents are transferred on the internet regularly e.g. circuit diagrams, scanned cheques, signed documents, drawings, design drafts etc. Here the method of image authentication, tampering detection and repairing is explained. The grayscale image document image authentication with self repair method is provided. The authentication signal is calculated from binary image of the original document image. Secret sharing scheme is used to calculate this authentication signal. The extra alpha channel is embedded in the original grayscale document image. The calculated authentication signal is then embedded in this alpha channel. This is one of the way of visual cryptography in which image is visible but authentication signal will not be recognized. Then this authentic image is encrypted for better security. this whole procedure is done at sender side. In second module i.e. receiver side the image is decrypted. Then the embedded authentication signal is extracted from the received authentic image. The new authentication signal is calculated from the binary image of the received authentic image. This new authentication signal is compared with the extracted signal and the integrity check is provided. If data modification is detected, then the method is proved to repair the tampered pixels using the reverse secret sharing method. The tampering of data is detected successfully in this method without any original image backup. This type of secret sharing scheme is helpful for reducing the risk of incidental partial data loss. This method is also applicable to the color image. Algorithm for color image is also same as grayscale images. In this paper the result is provided only for the grayscale images and supposed to expand for color images as well.

An Improved Non-Repudiate Scheme-Feature Marking Voice Signal Communication

Guaranteeing the ownership or copyright of digital communication is of extreme importance in this digital era. Watermarking is the technique which confirms the authenticity or integrity of communication by hiding relevant information in specified areas of the original signal such that it might render it difficult to distinguish one from the other. Thus, the digital watermark can be defined as a type of indicator secretly embedded in a noise tolerant signal such as image, audio or video data. The paper presents a voice signal authentication scheme by employing signal features towards the preparation of the watermark and by embedding it in the transform domain with the Walsh transforms. Watermark used in this technique is unique for each member participating in this communication system and makes it is very imperative in the context of signal authentication.

Fast Handover Pre-Authentication Protocol in 3GPP-WLAN Heterogeneous Mobile Networks

The demand of ubiquitous communications drives the development of advanced mobile technologies. Meanwhile, recent increases in mobile data usage and the emergence of new IP service applications constitute the motivation to integrate 3GPP cellular mobile systems with broadband WLANs. Since 3GPP and WLAN systems complement each other in terms of infrastructure and network coverage and bandwidth, 3GPP-WLAN Heterogeneous Mobile Networks based on the 3GPP-based Home Network (3GHN) are proposed for meeting the growing demands in high-speed data access on any mobile devices. However, heterogeneous radio access technologies and architectures lead to many interworking issues, such as network transparency, security mechanism, seamless handover, and quality of service. Among of them, security and handover are the major motives to ensure the confidentiality, reliability and continuity of services in 3GPP-WLAN Heterogeneous Mobile Networks. This paper proposes fast handover pre-authentication protocol to reduce the handover authentication latency and authentication signaling overhead during the whole handover session. The proposed protocol supports Intra-Domain Handover Pre-Authentication (Intra-HO Pre-Auth) and Inter-Domain Handover Pre-Authentication (Inter-HO Pre-Auth) for preauthenticating the Mobile User (MS) prior to performing an Inter-domain Handover (Inter-domain HO)/Intra-domain Handover (Intra-domain HO) process. Meanwhile, the reduction in retrieving new Authentication Vector sand key sets from the Home Location Register/Home Subscriber Service/Authentication Center in 3GHN achieves for minimized redundant authentication signaling transactions between 3GPP domains and WLAN domains. In addition, this paper provides simulation results which show that the proposed Intra-HO Pre-Auth achieves 49% handover authentication performance improvement compared to EAP-AKA, and the proposed Inter-HO Pre-Auth achieves 26% handover authentication performance improvement as well.

Authentic NATFW NSLP Signaling in Next Generation Networks

Today, the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is widely used as the primary signaling protocol for multimedia communications over the Internet. It is also considered as the basic protocol of IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) of Next Generation Network architectures. However, security devices such as firewalls and NATs (Network Address Translation) prevent their traversal for SIP protocol. This issue has prompted several research works that led to a multitude of solutions such as NATFW NSLP. Nevertheless, the approach adopted by the latter weakens the NATs and firewalls from security point of view. Therefore, to prevent unauthenticated users and unauthorized access, authentication and authorization mechanisms should be included in this protocol. In this work, we proposed the HMAC authentication mechanism that we have integrated in NATFW NSLP protocol, and with a test platform, we evaluated its performance metrics.

Joint Sparse Representation for Robust Multimodal Biometrics Recognition

Traditional biometric recognition systems rely on a single biometric signature for authentication. While the advantage of using multiple sources of information for establishing the identity has been widely recognized, computational models for multimodal biometrics recognition have only recently received attention. We propose a multimodal sparse representation method, which represents the test data by a sparse linear combination of training data, while constraining the observations from different modalities of the test subject to share their sparse representations. Thus, we simultaneously take into account correlations as well as coupling information among biometric modalities. A multimodal quality measure is also proposed to weigh each modality as it gets fused. Furthermore, we also kernelize the algorithm to handle nonlinearity in data. The optimization problem is solved using an efficient alternative direction method. Various experiments show that the proposed method compares favorably with competing fusion-based methods.

Versatile identity-based signatures for authentication in multi-user settings

This paper proposes a new identity-based signature scheme. The new scheme is proven to be existentially unforgeable against Chosen-Principle and Chosen-Message CP-CM attackers who are the strongest attackers so far defined for identity-based signatures. The security of our scheme relies on the standard Computational Diffie-Hellman CDH assumption. The proof is given in the random oracle model where a hash function is modelled as random oracle. Analysis shows that our scheme is also more efficient than the state of the art in terms of computation and communication. We finally improve the basic scheme by eliminating the single-point problem, allow using as a proxy signature scheme and enable fast verification in multi-user settings. The basic scheme and its extensions show that our proposal is versatile to realise efficient and secure authentication in various scenarios.

Improving the Quality of Delay-Based PUFs via Optical Proximity Correction

Silicon physically unclonable functions (PUFs) are circuits that exploit modern manufacturing variations to generate unique signatures for chip authentication and cryptographic key generation. Existing research has focused on improving PUF quality at architectural or design levels, but has ignored opportunities available during fabrication, which is the source of systematic and random variation in (ICs)/PUFs. For typical ICs (where security is not a concern), optical proximity correction (OPC) is used to suppress both these types of variations. However, several prior works have shown that only systematic variations negatively impact PUF quality and random variations are beneficial for PUFs. In this paper, we propose two PUF-aware OPC cost functions: 1) P-OPC generates a PUF lithography mask that increases all variations in PUF circuitry (the opposite of state-of-the-art OPC), and 2) SVC-OPC generates mask patterns that reduce the systematic variation found in PUFs for better quality. Simulation results for ring oscillator (RO) PUFs show that the proposed techniques can improve PUF signature quality compared to current state-of-the-art OPC.