The integration of artificial intelligence technology with a scalable Internet of Things (IoT) platform facilitates diverse smart communication services, allowing remote users to access services from anywhere at any time. The multi-server environment within IoT introduces a flexible security service model, enabling users to interact with any server through a single registration. To ensure secure and privacy preservation services for resources, an authentication scheme is essential. Zhao et al. recently introduced a user authentication scheme for the multi-server environment, utilizing passwords and smart cards, claiming resilience against well-known attacks. This paper conducts cryptanalysis on Zhao et al.'s scheme, focusing on denial of service and privacy attacks, revealing a lack of user-friendliness. Subsequently, we propose a new multi-server user authentication scheme for privacy preservation with fuzzy commitment over the IoT environment, addressing the shortcomings of Zhao et al.'s scheme. Formal security verification of the proposed scheme is conducted using the ProVerif simulation tool. Through both formal and informal security analyses, we demonstrate that the proposed scheme is resilient against various known attacks and those identified in Zhao et al.'s scheme.
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