An Efficient Distributed Group Key Management Using Hierarchical Approach with ECDH and Symmetric Algorithm

Abstract

Ensuring secure communication in an ad hoc network is extremely challenging because of the dynamic nature of the network and the lack of centralized management. For this reason, key management is particularly difficult to implement in such networks. Secure group communication is an increasingly popular research area having received much attention in recent years. Group key management is a fundamental building block for secure group communication systems. We will present an efficient many-to-many group key management protocol in distributed group communication. In this protocol, group members are managed in the hierarchical manner logically. Two kinds of keys are used, asymmetric and symmetric keys. The leaf nodes in the key tree are the asymmetric keys of the corresponding group members and all the intermediate node keys are symmetric keys assigned to each intermediate node. For asymmetric key, a more efficient key agreement will be introduced. To calculate intermediate node keys, members use codes assigned to each intermediate node key tree. Group members calculate intermediate node keys rather than distributed by a sponsor member. The features of this approach are that, no keys are exchanged between existing members at join, and only one key, the group key, is delivered to remaining members at leave.

Keywords: Elliptic Curve, Distributed Group Key Management, Hierarchical Key Management, Mobile Ad-hoc network (MANET).