Identity Management Framework Research Articles

Enhancing Cybersecurity with Blockchain-based Identity Management

In the digital age, the rapid increase in cyber threats has highlighted the need for more robust and secure identity management systems. Traditional centralized identity management systems are often vulnerable to data breaches, unauthorized access, and identity theft, posing significant risks to individuals and organizations. This paper explores the potential of blockchain technology to enhance cybersecurity through decentralized identity management. By leveraging the inherent properties of blockchain—such as immutability, transparency, and decentralization—blockchain-based identity management systems offer a more secure and efficient alternative to traditional methods. The paper provides an in-depth analysis of how blockchain can be utilized to store and manage digital identities securely, reducing the risk of identity fraud and data breaches. It examines various blockchain-based identity management frameworks, highlighting their advantages and potential challenges in implementation. Furthermore, the study discusses the integration of blockchain with other emerging technologies, such as cryptographic algorithms and smart contracts, to create a more resilient cybersecurity infrastructure. Through a review of current literature and case studies, the paper demonstrates the effectiveness of blockchain in enhancing data security and privacy while promoting user control over personal information. The findings suggest that adopting blockchain-based identity management could significantly mitigate cybersecurity threats and enhance trust in digital transactions. However, the paper also acknowledges the need for addressing scalability, regulatory compliance, and interoperability issues to fully realize the potential of blockchain in cybersecurity. This research contributes to the growing body of knowledge on innovative cybersecurity solutions and provides a foundation for future studies in the field.

Blockchain‐based decentralized oracle network framework for identity management in metaverse environment

AbstractManaging identities in metaverse environment is challenging due to the conflicting requirements of ensuring user privacy while enforcing accountability. Users may participate in the metaverse through multiple virtual identities or avatars for different applications/scenarios. Thus, virtual identities must be continuously generated and mapped with real identities. Further, user privacy needs to be protected while not ensuring blanket anonymity to indulge in objectionable or unlawful conduct. Ensuring privacy for the metaverse while still being able to pinpoint users for their actions in the metaverse is a significant research issue. Solving the aforementioned issue, we propose a third‐party identity management solution for the metaverse based on creating a decentralized oracle network (DON) providing identity authentication and mapping service. The proposed identity management framework is metaverse platform agnostic, ensuring users' privacy on the platform while still being able to uncover their real identities if warranted. The proposed framework is viable as evidenced by experimental results of DON and blockchain implementation. The DON based framework leverage the benefits of blockchain technology and introduces immutability, transparency, and traceability into the the metaverse environment. This ensures data integrity and minimizes the frequency of cyber attacks in the metaverse ecosystem.

Next-Generation Threat Detection and Mitigation in 6G Wireless Networks Using IAM, ZTNA and Advanced Security Mechanisms

As the deployment of 6G wireless networks looms on the horizon, the imperative to fortify their security infrastructure becomes increasingly pressing. One way to achieve this is through Identity and Access Management (IAM) frameworks to implement strong authentication and authorization mechanisms. Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) architectures advocate for a shift towards continuous verification and least-privileged access principles. Secure network segmentation and behavior anomaly detection systems limit the scope of potential breaches. Intrusion Detection and Prevention Systems (IDPS) detect and block cyber threats. These advanced security mechanisms improve the resilience of 6G networks and ensure the integrity, confidentiality, and availability of critical network assets. IAM protocols exhibit fast user authentication speeds with average authentication time of 0.5 seconds. ZTNA frameworks ensure high network security with a 98% detection rate of abnormal network behaviors

Next-Generation Threat Detection and Mitigation in 6G Wireless Networks Using IAM, ZTNA and Advanced Security Mechanisms

As the deployment of 6G wireless networks looms on the horizon, the imperative to fortify their security infrastructure becomes increasingly pressing. One way to achieve this is through Identity and Access Management (IAM) frameworks to implement strong authentication and authorization mechanisms. Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) architectures advocate for a shift towards continuous verification and least-privileged access principles. Secure network segmentation and behavior anomaly detection systems limit the scope of potential breaches. Intrusion Detection and Prevention Systems (IDPS) detect and block cyber threats. These advanced security mechanisms improve the resilience of 6G networks and ensure the integrity, confidentiality, and availability of critical network assets. IAM protocols exhibit fast user authentication speeds with average authentication time of 0.5 seconds. ZTNA frameworks ensure high network security with a 98% detection rate of abnormal network behaviors.

Blockchain-based self-sovereign identity solution for aerial base station integrated networks

Identity and access management frameworks address user access rights and data governance for organizations, vendors and users. In response to the problems associated with centralized authorities (e.g. single point of failure, limited scalability, lack of user control), new identity management models have emerged, such as Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), which relies on verifiable data registers to validate Decentralized Identifier (DIDs) and can be achieved in many different ways, e.g. through Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT), distributed databases or other decentralized systems. The main goal of SSI is to enable users to take control of managing their data shared with different services. In this paper, we examine a possible application of the SSI concept to aerial base station (ABS)- integrated networks. The paper presents the effective use of DID implementation to provide a secure and decentralized way to create, associate and verify credentials and identities of ABSs, ensuring secure communication between Ground Base stations (GBSs) and other nodes in the network in a multi-operator scenario. In the numerical results, the average values of various metrics (namely, the average credential presentation time, the average credential offer time, the average DIDcomm connection creation time, the average DIDcomm signing time, and the average DIDcomm revoke credential time) related to credential operations in a DID management system are given for three different number of requests (50 K, 75 K, and 100 K). We have also provided the values of the different status codes that occurred in 100 K operations in the same DID management system. Towards the end of the paper, a comparison is made between SSI-based and Non-fungible token (NFT)-based blockchain solutions, also discussing the challenges and future directions of SSI solutions in the context of ABS-integrated networks.

CIM: CP-ABE-based identity management framework for collaborative edge storage

CIM: CP-ABE-based identity management framework for collaborative edge storage

A privacy-preserving attribute-based framework for IoT identity lifecycle management

The Internet of Things (IoT) has brought a new era of interconnected devices and seamless data exchange. As the IoT ecosystem continues to expand, there is an increasing need for effective identity management mechanisms, specifically for authorization processes and access control. The pervasiveness of such devices demands that desirable solutions tackle not only security properties but also privacy aspects like granular control over which identity data is shared in authentication/authorization processes, covering aspects like bootstrapping, enrolment, and service provision. In this context, it is natural to turn to privacy-enhancing technologies, like (privacy-preserving) Attribute-Based Credentials (p-ABC), for achieving both high security and privacy guarantees. Nonetheless, these technical tools need to be accompanied by a comprehensive approach that deals with the particularities of IoT scenarios and covers the full lifetime of the device. In this work, we propose the use of a p-ABC scheme with support for distributed issuance (dp-ABC) as a keystone for privacy-preserving attribute-based authentication and authorization in IoT scenarios. We integrate said cryptographic scheme with W3C’s Verifiable Credentials standard, evaluating its impact to gauge its feasibility. The integration facilitates adoption and, particularly, allows the solution to transparently coexist with simpler techniques in heterogeneous scenarios that demand them. Moreover, we define and analyse a generic and comprehensive framework for identity management that identifies challenges throughout the device’s lifetime to achieve IoT privacy-preserving identity management following self-sovereign principles. We show how the various aspects identified in the framework are tackled in a concrete instantiation as part of the H2020 project ERATOSTHENES.

ChainDiscipline - Towards a Blockchain-IoT-Based Self-Sovereign Identity Management Framework

In today's complex Internet platform, online users need help to protect their online identity. Only sometimes, websites are very transparent about how user data will be collected, stored and processed by them. Sometimes Internet entities collect more online user information than required. These entities often share user identity-related data with third parties without consent. Existing traditional identity schemes need to be improved to stop and counter new ways of digital identity theft and fraud. Blockchain is a promising technology to strengthen the preservation of online users' digital identity due to its decentralised nature and robust data security features. In this paper, we proposed and implemented a generic blockchain- IoT-based self-sovereign identity management framework called ChainDiscipline. We have demonstrated the framework's oper- ability and functionality by implementing healthcare and smart home data management-based use cases.

Enhancing identity and access management using Hyperledger Fabric and OAuth 2.0: A block-chain-based approach for security and scalability for healthcare industry

Block-chain-based Identity and access management framework is a promising solution to privacy and security issues raised during the exchange of patient data in the healthcare industry. This technology ensures the confidentiality and integrity of sensitive information by providing a decentralized and immutable ledger. In our research, we propose an identity and access management system that employs Hyper-ledger Fabric and OAuth 2.0 for improved security and scalability. This combination allows for transparency and immutability of user transactions and minimizes the risk of fraud and unauthorized access. Additionally, Hyper-ledger Fabric's privacy, security, and scalability features enable granular access control to sensitive information, while OAuth 2.0 authorizes only trusted third-party applications to access specific data on the Fabric network. The proposed approach can handle large volumes of data and support multiple applications, thus providing a secure and scalable solution for managing access to the Fabric network. Moreover, our solution employs Role-based access control based on the patient's role, ensuring privacy and confidentiality. Our statistical analysis demonstrates that the proposed approach can efficiently and securely manage patient identity and access, potentially transforming the healthcare industry by enhancing data interoperability, reducing fraud and errors, and improving patient privacy and security. Furthermore, our solution can facilitate compliance with regulatory requirements such as HIPAA and GDPR.

Peer-to-Peer User Identity Verification Time Optimization in IoT Blockchain Network.

Blockchain introduces challenges related to the reliability of user identity and identity management systems; this includes detecting unfalsified identities linked to IoT applications. This study focuses on optimizing user identity verification time by employing an efficient encryption algorithm for the user signature in a peer-to-peer decentralized IoT blockchain network. To achieve this, a user signature-based identity management framework is examined by using various encryption techniques and contrasting various hash functions built on top of the Modified Merkle Hash Tree (MMHT) data structure algorithm. The paper presents the execution of varying dataset sizes based on transactions between nodes to test the scalability of the proposed design for secure blockchain communication. The results show that the MMHT data structure algorithm using SHA3 and AES-128 encryption algorithm gives the lowest execution time, offering a minimum of 36% gain in time optimization compared to other algorithms. This work shows that using the AES-128 encryption algorithm with the MMHT algorithm and SHA3 hash function not only identifies malicious codes but also improves user integrity check performance in a blockchain network, while ensuring network scalability. Therefore, this study presents the performance evaluation of a blockchain network considering its distinct types, properties, components, and algorithms' taxonomy.

A secure blockchain-enabled vehicle identity management framework for intelligent transportation systems

The need for secure and reliable identity management and authentication scheme for vehicles is becoming increasingly prominent with the digitization of the Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) in smart cities. Today, ITS is extensively acknowledged and employed in a variety of nations. Several existing ITS solutions in smart cities have observant limitations such as trust, security, threats, and centralization platform that can be vulnerable to the authentication and validation of vehicles. The differentiation in compatibility and requirement of IoT-based applications/services produced different challenges for establishing a uniform standard for data exchange, data usage, encoding mechanisms, and data storage for the identity management of vehicles. In this paper, identity generation and management methods are proposed using Blockchain to address existing challenges in ITS applications prevailing with the security of existing identity management and authentication of vehicles. The proposed solution focuses mainly on assurance of the validity of Personal Identification Information (PII) used for producing identity and usability of the application to make the solution suitable to raise the vehicle administration in the ITS. The experiment results and performance analysis represent that the proposed method ensures the correctness and validity of the PII and ensures the reliability and trustworthiness of such identity by securing the correct mapping of a user.

Blockchain-based identity management and access control framework for open banking ecosystem

Financial institutions are following an open banking (OB) trend for service innovation and integration. OB allows third-party service providers (TSPs) to access user financial data for purposes of finding the best deals and improving user experiences. The trust in third parties required for OB ecosystem success raises questions about digital identity integration, data sharing, and privacy preservation. Decentralized applications (DApps) for classifying and protecting data privacy, recording user consent, tracking TSP access actions, managing application programming interfaces (APIs), and preserving self-sovereign identities already exist, but in some countries such as Taiwan they have yet to be integrated into an operable three-phase OB approach. After identifying all major requirements of primary OB participants, we develop a blockchain-based identity management and access control (BIMAC) framework that shares some advantages of both traditional banking and blockchain technology. The BIMAC infrastructure applies smart contracts and a stateless authentication mechanism to form a reliable personal information transaction security control (PITSC) platform that offers such functionalities as decentralized third-party login (TPL), the ability to open bank accounts online, data authorization/revocation, integrated payouts, and TSP access monitoring. System performance evaluation results indicate that the frequent execution functions of the proposed framework have lower computation costs than the average transaction cost of public Ethereum.

Design and Implementation of Distributed Identity and Access Management Framework for Internet of Things (IoT) Enabled Distribution Automation

The smart grid and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies play vital roles in improving the quality of services offered in traditional electrical grid. They open a room for the introduction of new services like distribution automation (DA) that has a significant advantage to both utility companies and final consumers. DA integrates sensors, actuators, intelligent electrical devices (IED) and information and communication technologies to monitor and control electrical grid. However, the integration of these technologies poses security threats to the electrical grid like Denial of Service (DoS) attacks, false data injection attacks, and masquerading attacks like system node impersonation that can transmit wrong readings, resulting in false alarm reports and hence leading to incorrect node actuation. To overcome these challenges, researchers have proposed a centralized public key infrastructure (PKI) with bridged certificate authority (CA) which is prone to DoS attacks. Moreover, the proposed blockchain based distributed identity and access management (DIAM) in IoT domain at the global scale is adding communicational and computational overheads. Also. It is imposing new security threats to the DA system by integrating it with online services like IoTEX and IoTA. For those reasons, this study proposes a DIAM security scheme to secure IoT-enabled distribution automation. The scheme divides areas into clusters and each cluster has a device registry and a registry controller. The registry controller is a command line tool to access and manage a device registry. The results show that the scheme can prevent impersonated and non-legitimate system nodes and users from accessing the system by imposing role-based access control (RBAC) at the cluster level.
 Keywords: Distributed Identity and Access Management; Electrical Secondary Distribution Network; Internet of Things; IoT Enabled Distribution Automation; Smart Grid Security

A Multi-Factor Authentication-Based Framework for Identity Management in Cloud Applications

User's data is considered as a vital asset of several organizations. Migrating data to the cloud computing is not an easy decision for any organization due to the privacy and security concerns. Service providers must ensure that both data and applications that will be stored on the cloud should be protected in a secure environment. The data stored on the public cloud will be vulnerable to outside and inside attacks. This paper provides interactive multi-layer authentication frameworks for securing user identities on the cloud. Different access control policies are applied for verifying users on the cloud. A security mechanism is applied to the cloud application that includes user registration, granting user privileges, and generating user authentication factor. An intrusion detection system is embedded to the security mechanism to detect malicious users. The multi factor authentication, intrusion detection, and access control techniques can be used for ensuring the identity of the user. Finally, encryption techniques are used for protecting the data from being disclosed. Experimental results are carried out to verify the accuracy and efficiency of the proposed frameworks and mechanism. The results recorded high detection rate with low false positive alarms.

Identity Governance Framework for Privileged Users

Information technology companies have grown in size and recognized the need to protect their valuable assets. As a result, each IT application has its authentication mechanism, and an employee needs a username and password. As the number of applications increased, as a result, it became increasingly complex to manage all identities like the number of usernames and passwords of an employee. All identities had to be retrieved by users. Both the identities and the access rights associated with those identities had to be protected by an administrator. Management couldn’t even capture such access rights because they couldn’t verify things like privacy and security. Identity management can help solve this problem. The concept behind identity management is to centralize identity management and manage access identity centrally rather than multiple applications with their authentication and authorization mechanisms. In this research work, we develop governance and an identity management framework for information and technology infrastructures with privileged access management, consisting of cybersecurity policies and strategies. The results show the efficiency of the framework compared to the existing information security components. The integrated identity and access management and privileged access management enable organizations to respond to incidents and facilitate compliance. It can automate use cases that manage privileged accounts in the real world.

A Scalable Block Chain Framework for User Identity Management in a Decentralized Network

In a decentralized network every user makes use of personal identity details at different places for various services and these details are shared with third-parties without their consent and stored at an unknown location. Organizations like government, banks and social platforms are considered to be the weakest area in the current identity management system as they are vulnerable which in turn leads to compromising billions of user identity data. Block chain based User Identity Management is a solution which provides a decentralized environment that manages the user identity data and their related Know-Your-Customer documents in a distributed ledger. All the transactions of the network are stored in the block, which is a type of a data structure and these blocks are validated using the powerful consensus algorithms and linked to form a block chain. Smart contracts will act as an interface between the client and the block chain network. User’s information cannot be provided to any third party vendors without the explicit consent of the user. This paper proposes a framework for User Identity Management using Block chain technology in a decentralized network. The proposed framework ensures a high level privacy and security for the personal identity details and the documents. In addition to that the performance analysis of the framework is presented in terms of Transaction immutability, Mining Resource, Memory utilization and Difficulty Variation. The results of the analysis proves that the proposed framework performs better in terms of all these factors.

Proposing a digital identity management framework: A mixed‐method approach

AbstractThis research aims to study the most critical elements of digital identity management to recognize the pattern and the requirements of their use and implementation. Further, an attempt is made to identify and prioritize the criteria and their relevant indicators of digital identity management in the form of a comprehensive framework. To this end a fuzzy multicriteria decision‐making approach was utilized. The framework focuses on a comprehensive perspective to consider digital identity and deals with compiling strategies and operational patterns based on the defined priorities. This applied research with a fundamental approach has a descriptive‐explanatory method as well. Through an in depth‐review of the extant literature and designing an instrument as well as semi‐structure interview the necessary data were collected. The research population consists of 10 experts. By reviewing the theoretical literature of the research, effective factors were identified and screened by the Fuzzy Delphi method leading to six main factors and 31 subfactors. Then, the collected data were analyzed through a hybrid technique known as FDANP (Fuzzy DEMATEL‐ANP) to determine the interactions between the factors and the subfactors and to weigh and prioritize them. The obtained results revealed that “strategic planning” is the most influential factor in digital identity management. Also, the subfactors namely “The use of the maturity model of digital identity management,” “commitment to the whole organization,” “integrity of digital identity management system with other systems,” “integrity of digital identity management program,” and “integrity of the two dimensions of identity management and access management” were ranked as the most influential subfactors of “strategic planning,” respectively. “Access management” was the most permeable factor in digital identity management. It means that this factor is the main problem and could be solved with the help of the influential factors. In addition, subfactors: “Access control to all resources only through the digital identity management system,” “Solution for access management of premium accounts,” “Multi‐factor authentication support,” “Access policy to all resources and information,” and “Determination of the manner of the user access to resources outside the organization” were ranked as the most permeable subfactors.

Legal Frameworks: A Starting Point for Strengthening Medicolegal Death Investigation Systems and Improving Cause and Manner of Death Statistics in Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Systems.

Medicolegal death investigation systems, which generally fall within one of three types-medical examiner, coroner, or law-enforcement-led systems-investigate deaths that are unnatural or suspicious. The current quality of cause of death statistics on deaths investigated within medicolegal death investigation systems globally limits effective public health response. A starting point to strengthening global medicolegal death investigation systems and improving the quality of cause and manner of death reported to civil registration systems is through a strong legal framework. Two resources, the United Nations Statistics Division Guidelines on the Legislative Framework for Civil Registration, Vital Statistics and Identity Management and the Global Health Advocacy Incubator Legal and Regulatory Toolkit for Civil Registration, Vital Statistics and Identity Management, present recommendations and provide guidance to country stakeholders in reviewing and revising their medicolegal death investigation legal frameworks. Physician determination of cause and manner of death, defined criteria for case referral to the medicolegal death investigation system, an amendment process, and investigation collaboration are four core considerations for medicolegal death investigation system legal frameworks. A strong medicolegal death investigation legal framework is a necessary starting point, but it is not sufficient for ensuring the timely, accurate, and complete reporting of cause and manner of death in national vital statistics.

A Composable Multifactor Identity Authentication and Authorization Scheme for 5G Services

The fifth-generation (5G) mobile communication technology has already deployed commercially and become a global research focus. The new features of 5G include unlimited information exchange, a large variety of connections with independent energy, and diversified high transmission rate services. Collective synergy of services is expected to change the way of life and future generations and introduce new converged services to the ICT industry. Different application services have to meet differentiated security demands. From the perspective of security, in order to support the multiservice of 5G services, it is necessary to consider the new security mechanism driven by the service. Based on 5G massive data stream, the 5G system can provide customized real-world services for potential users and reduce the user experience gap in different scenarios. However, 3GPP Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP), which is the present entity authentication mechanism for the 5G service layer, is only an individual authentication architecture and unable to fulfill the flexible security objectives of differentiated services. In this paper, we present a new hierarchical identity management framework as well as an adaptable and composable three-factor authentication and session key agreement protocol for different applications in 5G multiservice systems. Finally, we propose an authorization process by combining with the proposed three-factor authentication mechanism and Service-Based Architecture (SBA) proposed by the 3GPP committee. The proposed mechanism can concurrently provide diverse identity authentication schemes corresponding to four different security levels by easily splitting or assembling three-factor authentication protocol blocks. The proposed scheme can be simultaneously applied to a variety of applications to improve the efficiency and quality of service and reduce the complexity of the whole 5G multiservice system, instead of designing or adopting several different authentication protocols. The performance evaluation results indicate that the proposed scheme can guarantee the multiple security of the system with ideal efficiency.

A Smart Biometric Identity Management Framework for Personalised IoT and Cloud Computing-Based Healthcare Services.

This paper proposes a novel identity management framework for Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing-based personalized healthcare systems. The proposed framework uses multimodal encrypted biometric traits to perform authentication. It employs a combination of centralized and federated identity access techniques along with biometric based continuous authentication. The framework uses a fusion of electrocardiogram (ECG) and photoplethysmogram (PPG) signals when performing authentication. In addition to relying on the unique identification characteristics of the users’ biometric traits, the security of the framework is empowered by the use of Homomorphic Encryption (HE). The use of HE allows patients’ data to stay encrypted when being processed or analyzed in the cloud. Thus, providing not only a fast and reliable authentication mechanism, but also closing the door to many traditional security attacks. The framework’s performance was evaluated and validated using a machine learning (ML) model that tested the framework using a dataset of 25 users in seating positions. Compared to using just ECG or PPG signals, the results of using the proposed fused-based biometric framework showed that it was successful in identifying and authenticating all 25 users with 100% accuracy. Hence, offering some significant improvements to the overall security and privacy of personalized healthcare systems.