Skip to main content
Log in

On optimal batch rekeying for secure group communications in wireless networks

  • Published:
Wireless Networks Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Advances in wireless communications and mobile computing have led to the emergence of group communications and applications over wireless. In many of these group interactions, new members can join and current members can leave at any time, and existing members must communicate securely to achieve application-specific missions or network-specific functionality. Since wireless networks are resource-constrained, a key challenge is to provide secure and efficient group communication mechanisms that satisfy application requirements while minimizing the communication cost. Instead of individual rekeying, i.e., performing a rekey operation right after each join or leave request, periodic batch rekeying has been proposed to alleviate rekeying overhead in resource-constrained wireless networks. In this paper, we propose an analytical model to address the issue of how often batch rekeying should be performed. We propose threshold-based batch rekeying schemes and demonstrate that an optimal rekey interval exists for each scheme. We further compare these schemes to identify the best scheme that can minimize the communication cost of rekeying while satisfying application requirements when given a set of parameter values characterizing the operational and environmental conditions of the system. In a highly dynamic wireless environment in which the system parameter values change at runtime, our work may be used to adapt the rekeying interval accordingly.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12
Fig. 13
Fig. 14
Fig. 15
Fig. 16

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. C.K. Wong, M. Gouda and S.S. Lam, Secure group communications using key graphs, IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking 8(1) (Feb. 2000), 16–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. X. Li, Y.R. Yang, M.G. Gouda and S.S. Lam, Batch rekeying for secure group communications, in: Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on World Wide Web Hong Kong (July 2001), pp. 525–534.

  3. A. Perrig and J.D. Tygar, Secure Broadcast Communication in Wired and Wireless Networks (Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003).

  4. S. Setia, S. Koussih, S. Jajodia and E. Harder, Kronos: A scalable group rekeying approach for secure multicast, in: IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (Oakland, CA, May 2000), pp. 215–228.

  5. S. Zhu, S. Setia and S. Jajodia, Performance optimizations for group key management schemes, in: Proceedings of the 23rd IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (Providence, Rhode Island, May 2003), pp. 163–171.

  6. S. Zhu and S. Jajodia, A scalable and reliable key distribution protocol for multicast group rekeying, Technical Report, GMU, (Jan. 2002).

  7. Y.R. Yang, X. Li, X. Zhang and S.S. Lam, Reliable group rekeying: A performance analysis, in: ACM SIGCOMM 2001 (San Diego, August 2001), Vol. 31, No. 4, pp. 27–38.

    Google Scholar 

  8. C.K. Wong and S.S. Lam, Keystone: A group key management system, in: International Conference on Telecom's, Acapulco, Mexico (May 2000).

  9. G. Ciardo, R.M. Fricks, J.K. Muppala and K.S. Trivedi, SPNP Users Manual Version 6 (Department Electrical Engineering, Duke University, 1999).

  10. G. Ciardo, R.M. Fricks, J.K. Muppala and K.S. Trivedi, SPNP Reference Guide Version 4 (Department Electrical Engineering, Duke University, 1994).

  11. R.A. Sahner, K.S. Trivedi and A. Puliafito, Performance and Reliability Analysis of Computer Systems: An Example-Based Approach Using the Sharpe Software Package (Kluwer Academic, 1996).

  12. M. Steiner, G. Tsudik and M. Waidner, Key agreement in dynamic peer groups, IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems 11(8) (August 2000), pp. 769–980.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. M. Moharrum, R. Mukkamala and M. Eltoweissy, Efficient secure multicast with well-populated multicast key trees, in: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Systems, IEEE Computer Society (July 2004), pp. 215–222.

  14. T. Hardjono, B. Cain and I. Monga, Intra-Domain Group Key Management Protocol (Internet Draft, Feb. 1998).

  15. D.M. Wallner, E.G. Harder and R.C. Agee, Key Management for Multicast: Issues and Architecture (Internet Draft, Sept. 1998).

  16. L. Lazos and R. Poovendran, Energy-aware secure multicast communication in ad hoc networks using geographic location information, IEEE International Conference on Acoustics Speech and Signal Processing 4 (April 2003), pp. 201–204.

  17. R.D. Pietro, L.V. Mancini and S. Jajodia, Security and middleware services: efficient and secure keys management for wireless mobile communications, in: Proceedings of the 2nd ACM International Workshop on Principles of Mobile Computing, Toulouse, France (Oct. 2002), pp. 66–73.

  18. R.D. Pietro, L.V. Mancini, Y.W. Law, S. Etalle and P. Havinga, LKHW: A directed diffusion-based secure multicast scheme for wireless sensor networks, in: Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on Wireless Security and Privacy, Kaohsiung, Taiwan (Oct. 2003), pp. 397–406.

  19. K Ghumman, M.F. Younis and M. Eltoweissy, Location-aware combinatorial key management scheme for clustered sensor networks, IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems 17(8) (Aug. 2006), pp. 865–882.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. A. Ghosh and F. Anjum, Wireless network security II: last hop topology sensitive multicasting key management, in: Proceedings of the 1st ACM International Workshop on Quality of Service and Security in Wireless and Mobile Networks, Montreal, Quebec, Canada (Oct. 2005), pp. 63–70.

  21. J.H. Cho, I.R. Chen and M. Eltoweissy, Optimization of batch rekey interval for secure group communications in wireless networks, in: 2005 IEEE International Conference on Wireless Networks, Communications, and Mobile Computing, Vol. 1, Maui, Hawaii (July 2005), pp. 522–527.

  22. E. Jung, X.-Y. Liu and M.G. Gouda, Key bundles and parcels: secure communication in many groups, in: Proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on Networked Group Communications, LNCS 2816, ed. B. Stiller, Springer-Verlag, Munich, Germany (Sept. 2003), pp. 119–130.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jin-Hee Cho.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Cho, JH., Chen, IR. & Eltoweissy, M. On optimal batch rekeying for secure group communications in wireless networks. Wireless Netw 14, 915–927 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-007-0032-y

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-007-0032-y

Keywords

Navigation