A SECURE KEY TRANSFER PROTOCOL FOR GROUP COMMUNICATION

Advanced Computing: An International Journal ( ACIJ ), Vol.3, No.6, November 2012
DOI : 10.5121/acij.2012.3610 83
A SECURE KEY TRANSFER PROTOCOL FOR GROUP
COMMUNICATION
R. Velumadhava Rao1
, K Selvamani2
, R Elakkiya3
1
Department of Computer Science, Rajalakshmi Institute of Technology, Chennai, India
Velu_b4u@yahoo.com
2
Department of Computer Science, Anna University, CEG, Chennai, India
smani@cs.annauniv.edu
3
Department of Computer Science, Jerusalem Engineering College, Chennai, India
elakkiyaceg@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Providing security for messages in group communication is more essential and critical nowadays. In
group oriented applications such as Video conferencing and entertainment applications, it is necessary to
secure the confidential data in such a way that intruders are not able to modify or transmit the data. Key
transfer protocols fully rely on trusted Key Generation Center (KGC) to compute group key and to
transport the group keys to all communication parties in a secured and secret manner. In this paper, an
efficient key generation and key transfer protocol has been proposed where KGC can broadcast group
key information to all group members in a secure way. Hence, only authorized group members will be
able to retrieve the secret key and unauthorized members cannot retrieve the secret key. Hence, inorder
to maintain the forward and backward secrecy, the group keys are updated whenever a new member joins
or leaves the communication group. The proposed algorithm is more efficient and relies on NP class. In
addition, the keys are distributed to the group users in a safe and secure way. Moreover, the key
generated is also very strong since it uses cryptographic techniques which provide efficient computation.
KEYWORDS
Key Distribution, Forward Secrecy; Backward Secrecy; Message Confidentiality
1. INTRODUCTION
Message Confidentiality is one of the most important features in secure group communication.
Message confidentiality ensures that the sender confidential data which can be read only by an
authorized and intended receiver. Hence, the confidential data is secured in efficient way such
that it is not tampered by unauthorized users. Message Confidentiality is achieved mainly by
two components namely Forward Secrecy and Backward Secrecy are used for message
confidentiality. The two main components provide secrecy as follows.
• Forward Secrecy: Forward Secrecy is a mechanism to ensure that whenever the user leaves
the group he will not have any access to the future key.
• Backward Secrecy: Backward Secrecy ensures that whenever a new user joins the group,
he will not get any access to the previous details.
The most common method used for achieving group communication in a secure way is by
encryption techniques. To provide a secure group communication, it is necessary to manage the
keys in a secure way for creating, updating and distribution of those keys. Moreover, before
exchanging the confidential data, the key establishment protocol has to distribute the group key
to all group entities in a secured and effective manner. The two important types of key
establishment protocols used to achieve this are namely key transfer protocols and key
agreement protocols. Key transfer protocols rely on KGC to select group key for

84
communicating information with the group members by sharing one or more secret key during
registration. But in key agreement protocols, the group key is determined by exchanging public
keys of two communication parties with the presence of communication entities.
The most commonly used key agreement protocol in the existing work is Diffie-Hellman (DH)
key agreement protocol [2]. However, the Diffie Hellman key distribution algorithm is limited
to provide secret key only for two entities, and cannot provide secret keys for the group that has
more than two members. When there are a more number of members in a group the time delay
for setting up the group key will take longer time. Hence, it is necessary to propose a new
technique to avoid this type of constraints in group communication. In this proposed work,
group communication applications will make use of key transfer protocol to transmit data to all
the group members with the minimum resources needed for this group communication. In the
existing approach, the distributed group key management protocol does not have the group
controller that controls the users in the group for secure group communication. Also, the
processing time and communication requirements increase when the number of users increases
in the group. Hence, it is necessary to propose a new technique that ensures the group
communication among the group using forward secrecy and backward secrecy, while avoiding
the existing overheads. Moreover, the members joining and leaving the group are efficiently
managed by encrypted key. Since, the key is generated and maintained for each member in a
group the confidentiality and security of the data in group communication is guaranteed. Also,
the computation time of the message distribution and key extraction from the message is fast,
when compared with the existing work.
In this work, it uses cryptographic techniques to secure key distribution and key management
for the group communication environment. The algorithms are analyzed with suitable samples.
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Chapter 2 surveys about the existing work
in this area. Chapter 3 explores the proposed work and Chapter 4 explores about the
implementation work. Chapter 5 analyzes and discusses the results obtained from the work.
Chapter 6 concludes the proposed and implemented work and suggested some possible
enhancements. .
2. RELATED WORK
There are many works pertaining to the secure Group Communication and that have been
carried out, but some of the important works has been surveyed and cited here. Among them,
Mike Burmester and Yvo Desmedt [3] presented a Group Key Exchange protocol which
extends the Diffie-Hellman protocol [2]. The protocol is scalable and secure against passive
attacks. But, Diffie Hellman public key distribution algorithm is able to provide group key only
for two entities. Bohli [4] developed a framework for robust group key agreement that provides
security against malicious insiders and active adversaries in an unauthenticated point-to-point
network. Bresson et al. [13] constructed a generic authenticated group Diffie-Hellman key
exchange algorithm which is more secure. Katz and Yung [5] proposed the first constant-round
and fully scalable group Diffie-Hellman protocol which is provably secure. There are many
other works related to group key management protocols based on non-DH key agreement
approaches. Among them, Tzeng [9] presented a conference key agreement protocol that relies
on discrete algorithm assumption with fault tolerance. This protocol establishes a conference
key even if there is several numbers of malicious participants in the conference. Hence, this
method is not suitable for group communication.
Moreover, in a centralized group key management, there is only one trusted entity responsible
for managing the entire group. Hence, the group controller need not depend on any auxiliary
entity to perform key distribution. Harney et al. [10] proposed a group key management

85
protocol that requires O(n) where n is the size of group, for encrypting and update a group key
when a user is evicted or added in backward and forward secrecy.
Eltoweissy et al.[6] developed a protocol based on Exclusion Basis Systems (EBS), a
combinatory formulation for the group key management problem. Lein Harn and Changlu Lin
[1] introduced a group key transfer protocol where members of the group fully rely on Key
Generation Center (KGC). They proposed an authenticated key transfer protocol based on secret
sharing scheme that KGC can broadcast group key information to all group members at once.
Chin-Yin Lee et al. [7] addressed the security issues and drawback associated with existing
group key establishment protocols. They have also used secret sharing scheme to propose a
secure key transfer protocol to exclude impersonators from accessing the group communication.
Their protocol can resist potential attack and also reduce the overhead of system
implementation. Burmester et.al [11] has presented a practical conference key distribution
systems based on public-keys and also authenticates the users. Rafael Martinez Pelaez et.al [14]
proposed a new dynamic ID-based remote user authentication scheme based on Hsian-Shih’s
scheme. In the proposed scheme users can create the login request message without known the
identification of each server and also it is more efficient in computation cost.
3. PROPOSED WORK
Based on the literature survey, it is necessary to propose a new model that communicates data in
a safe and secured manner in group communication. The proposed model consists of four
processes namely the User Registration, Group key generator based on prime numbers, Key
generation and Key distribution, Group re-keying. The four main processes are explained as
below.
3.1. User Registration
This module explains the process of User Registration and Key Computation. Each user has to
register their identity at KGC for subscribing the key distribution service. KGC keeps track of
all registered users and removes any unsubscribed users in the group. During registration
process, each user Ui is required to share a random secret value Si with the KGC. Once user
registration process is completed, KGC assigns a permanent secret id, denoted by Pi for each
member Ui in the group.
3.2. Group Key Generator Based on Prime Numbers
In group key generator, whenever there is a group of users participating in a group
communication, the Key Generation Center (KGC) will generate the message M. When there
are N members in the group such as N= (U1, U2,….., Un), then each member Ui will be assigned
a Pi, a large prime number > K where K is a group key.
3.3. Key Generation and Distribution
When a request is made by the user for group key generation, KGC randomly selects a group
key K whose value is less than Pi where (i = 1, 2 ..., n). KGC needs to distribute the group key
in a secure manner. Suppose if the group consist of n members, {U1, U2,..., Un} and the shared
primes are {P1, P2,.., Pn}. The group key can be any prime number or any number K < Pi
i∀ .That is P1>K, P2>K,..., Pn>K.
KGC now generate a message M and it’s value is calculated using a formula
M = ((P1 ⊕ S1)*(P2 ⊕ S2),..,*(Pn ⊕ Sn)) + K (1)

86
Figure 1. System Architecture
Figure 2. Process of secure key transfer
The Prime number Pi is XORed with Secret value Si where i= 1,2,...,n. Each XORed values are
multiplied and added along with the Key K. Now message M is broadcasted to all the members
Send a request join with
secret Si
Unique prime number Pi is
assigned to Ui
Sender Ui is added to the privileged
M = ((P1 ⊕ S1)*(P2 ⊕ S2),..,*(Pn ⊕ Sn)) + K
broadcast Message M to privileged group
Each group member Ui compute the key K = M
mod (Pi ⊕ Si) for all i.
New member Un+1 join the
system with secret Sn+1
Unique prime number Pn+1 is
assigned to Un+1
Sender Un+1 is added to the privileged group
M’ = ((P1 ⊕ S1),..,*(Pn ⊕ Sn)) *(Pn+1 ⊕ Sn+!) +
K, broadcast Message M to privileged group
New members then calculate the group key
using K = M’ mod (Pn+1 ⊕ Sn+!).
Sender Ui KGC Group G
Members
Join/Leave
Operation
KGC
Server
Registration
Key
Generation
Key
Distribution
EncryptionChannel
Key Distribution

87
in a group. Upon receiving the message M, the each member in the groups will generate the key
in the following manner.
K = M mod (Pi ⊕ Si) for all i. (2)
Each member in the group generates the Key by doing XOR operation with prime number and
the secret value. Then the modulus will be taken for the message M along with the value
calculated from the XORed operation.
3.4. Group Re-keying
Scalable group re-keying is the important task to be performed when user joins or leaves the
group in the secure group communication. The group keys needs to be updated to maintain the
forward and backward secrecy. To achieve this, the two important tasks namely members join
and members leave operation is performed.
3.4.1. Member Join
When a member wants to join the group, the new member will register with the KGC. KGC will
share a prime number Pn+1 where K < Pn+1. KGC generates the new key using the formula.
M’ = ((P1 ⊕ S1)*(P2 ⊕ S2),..,*(Pn ⊕ Sn)) *(Pn+1⊕ Sn+1) + K (3)
The prime number Pi and the secret value Si where i=1,2,...n is XORed. Each XORed values are
multiplied and then the group Key K is added along with that.Then the new member calculates
the group key by using the message M’.
K = M’ mod (Pn+1⊕ Sn+1) (4)
The new prime number Pn+1 and secret value Sn+1 is XORed and modulus will be taken along
with the new message M’.
3.4.2. Member Leave
When a member leaves the system, the member should inform to the KGC. Now KGC
generates a new group key as follows.
Step 1. KGC selects a new prime number K’ (where K’ < Pi for all i).
Step 2. New message M’’ is calculates using a formula.
M’’ = ((P1 ⊕ S1)*(P2 ⊕ S2),..,*(Pj-1 ⊕ Sj-1)) ((Pj+1 ⊕ Sj+1)*... (Pn ⊕ Sn)) + K’ (5)
The values of Pi and Si where i=1,2,..,n are XORed and the XORed values are multiplied also
added along with the new group Key K’. Now KGC broadcast a new message M’’ to all group
members. Upon receiving the message the group key is calculated by each member in the
following manner
K = M’’ mod (Pi ⊕ Si) (6)
In addition to this, the process for secure key transfer in group communication is shown in
Figure 2. The members who wish to join the group send a request with secret identity S1 which
is responded by KGC with unique prime number P1. KGC generates message M using the
formula (1) and broadcast M to the privileged group members. Each group member is able to
compute the group key K using the formula (2). Similarly, whenever member joins/leaves the
system group key K and message M is regenerated.

88
4. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
The experimental setup consists of group of 10 members. Members 1,2,..,10 has the permanent
prime id (Prime) as, P1=55837, P2=55603, P3=35353, P4=54709, P5=60799, P6=45953,
P7=40847, P8=39461, P9=42709, P10=58909 respectively along with the group key K= 22971.
Moreover, the secret key shared by the users are S1=28931, S2=37123, S3=12347, S4=13745,
S5=16231, S6=31234, S7=21467, S8=25431, S9=17237, S10=21719. By applying equation (1)
Message is generated by KGC, and the generated messages are
M=55131157819910041417986790291061886647009280000 along with the group key
K=22971 is manipulated according to equation (1) and then it is broadcasted to all the ten
members in the group.
After receiving this message, member1 computes the key (K) by equating (2) as M % (P1⊕ S1).
i.e.,K=55131157819910041417986790291061886647009302971 % (55387⊕ 28931). The
value obtained from the above calculated results in the original key value which is 22971.
Similarly all the other members in the group calculate their keys by doing M % (Pi ⊕ Si), i=2,
3...10. We have taken K (Key) sizes as 64,128, 512, 1024 bits and the value of S (prime) has
been taken has 64, 128, 512 and 1024 bits. When a non-group member mk attempts to compute
the group key with a value Pk=43651, Sk= 45079 and the above message M. The member mk
will not able to calculate the key. i.e., M % (Pk ⊕ Sk) = 513115781991004141798679029106188
6647009302971 % (43651⊕ 45079) = 2559≠22971≠K.
5. PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS
The performance analysis of the proposed and implemented system is measured with respect to
the size of group members. As the group size increases the value of Message generation time
and Key Extraction time gets increased. The observed values are plotted in a graph. The
performance of the algorithm for generating the message M for different group size is shown in
Fig.3. From the graph shown it is observed that the proposed technique is more efficient and
takes less time for generating message for small groups.
0
5
10
15
5 10 15 20 25
MessageGeneration
Timeinms
Group Size (n)
0
10
20
30
40
5 10 15 20 25
KeyExtractionTime
insecondsx10-5
Group Size (n)
Figure. 3 (a) Message generation for small groups (b) Key extraction for small groups

89
The Message Generation time is measured in milliseconds (ms). Moreover, it is found that the
efficiency of the algorithm for extracting the key takes less time. Also, it is observed that when
the group size increases the Key Extraction time also increases rapidly. The strength of the RSA
algorithm relies on the fact that the given M (product of two large prime numbers), it is not
possible to find the two factors in polynomial time (It is NP-hard). In this proposed algorithm, it
has more complex message M, than what is used in RSA algorithm. Therefore, it is very
difficult to find any of the prime numbers P1, P2,.., Pn is NP-hard. Thus the Key K is more
secure and safe preventing it from man-in-the-middle attack and brute-force attack. To maintain
the forward and backward secrecy, KGC generates a new message and broadcast it everytime
when a member join or leaves the system.
5. CONCLUSION
Key transfer protocol relies on a trusted Key Generation Center (KGC) to select group key and
to distribute group keys to all group entities in a secret manner. KGC assign a large prime
number to each member in the group. Since the chosen message M as more complex which is
compared with the RSA algorithm, the proposed technique is proved to be more efficient key
transfer protocol used for group communication. Our proposed algorithm is efficient both in
terms of message generation and key extraction. In future, attempts can be made to implement
the design for communication with dynamic and hierarchical groups.
REFERENCES
[1] Lein Harn and Changlu Lin. Authenticated Group Key Transfer Protocol Based on Secret
Sharing. IEEE Trans.Computers; Vol.59, no.6, 2010, pp.842-846.
[2] W. Diffie and M.E. Hellman. New Directions in Cryptography. IEEE Trans. Information
Theory; Vol. IT-22, No. 6, 1976, pp.644-654.
[3] Mike Burmester and Yvo Desmedt. A Secure and Scalable Group Key Exchange System,”
Information Processing Letters; 94(3), 2005, pp. 137—143.
[4] Bohli. A Framework for Robust Group Key Agreement. In Computational Science and Its
applications - ICCSA 2006 (3), Lecture Notes in Computer Science; vol. 3982, Springer 2006,
pp. 355-364.
[5] J. Katz and M. Yung. Scalable Protocols for Authenticated Group Key Exchange. J Cryptology;
Vol. 20, 2007, pp. 85-113.
[6] M. Eltoweissy, M.H. Heydari, L. Morales, and I.H. Sudborough, “Combinatorial Optimization
of Group Key Management,” J. Network and Systems Management, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 33-50,
2004.
[7] Chia-Yin Lee, Zhi-Hui Wang, Lein Harn, Chin-Chen Chang. Secure Key Transfer Protocol
Based on Secret Sharing for Group Communications. IEICE Transactions; 94-D(11), 2011,pp.
2069-2076.
[8] E. Bresson, O. Chevassut, and D. Pointcheval. Provably-Secure Authenticated Group Diffie-
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51(4), 2002, pp 373-379.
[10] H. Harney, C. Muckenhirn, and T. Rivers. Group Key Management Protocol (GKMP)
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[12] M. Steiner, G. Tsudik, and M. Waidner. Diffie-Hellman Key Distribution Extended to Group
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Authors
R.Velumadhava Rao received the B.E degree in Computer Science and Engineering from C.I.E.T,
Coimbatore and M.E degree in Software Engineering from College of Engineering, Guindy, Anna
University, Chennai, India. He is currently working as an Assistant Professor in Rajalakshmi Institute of
Technology, Chennai.
K.Selvamani received the B.E degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Annamalai
University, Chidambaram and M.E degree in Computer Science and Engineering from Bharathiyar
University, Coimbatore in December 2000 and a Ph.D degree in Computer Science and Engineering
from Anna University in 2011. He is currently working as a Assistant Professor in College of
Engineering, Guindy, Anna University, Chennai. His research interest include Web Security,
Cryptography and Network Security.
R. Elakkiya received her B.E degree in Computer Science and Engineering from Periyar Maniammai
college of technology for women, Thanjavur and M.E degree in Software Engineering from College of
Engineering Guindy, Ana University, Chennai, India. She is currently working as an Assistant Profesor
in Jerusalem College of Engineering, Chennai.

A SECURE KEY TRANSFER PROTOCOL FOR GROUP COMMUNICATION

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A SECURE KEY TRANSFER PROTOCOL FOR GROUP COMMUNICATION