1. Introduction
The Space–Air–Ground Integrated Network (SAGIN) is a heterogeneous network architecture consisting of satellite, aerial, and territorial segments [
1]. Integrating different networks expands cyberspace from the traditional internet to the land, sea, sky, and outer space, making SAGIN vital for strategic importance [
2]. Space information is a crucial point of society and cyberspace. Thus, the security of space information has to be strengthened [
3]. As the first line of network defense, access authentication and key distribution schemes are crucial technology to prevent illegal terminals for the security of SAGINs [
4].
The high mobility, low latency, and limited resource in SAGIN have put forward higher requirements for security issues, such as identity authentication and data security [
5]. Besides, access at any time means high-quality network services, such as dynamic access and a smooth handover authentication mechanism caused by the movement of satellites.
A lightweight authentication protocol has been proposed based on different techniques. Public key cryptography is suitable for dynamic terminals to access SAGIN. Schemes based on elliptic curve cryptography and symmetric keys to provide anonymity and authentication were proposed [
6,
7,
8,
9,
10]. However, the operation over the elliptic curve is time-consuming. Some schemes based on the symmetric key, secret sharing, or group key are lightweight and need less communication overhead [
11,
12,
13]. Nevertheless, the pre-shared symmetric key is always the key point in modern cryptography, and key distribution and management are the foundation of cryptography. The assumption that many different terminals pre-share symmetric keys with satellites or ground servers is unrealistic.
In order to reduce the exchange procedure, a solution with bilinear pairings was proposed, but it is resource-consuming for the terminal and satellites [
14,
15,
16]. As the privacy protection requirements, a lightweight authentication protocol was proposed based on 3GPP AKA for the fast grouping of the satellites [
17]. An improved authentication method based on tokens was proposed, which can provide the anonymity of the terminal but still did not reduce the burden on the management center [
18]. The blockchain-based on hash is an alternative scheme to reduce the complexity of negotiation among different terminals and regions [
19,
20,
21,
22]. However, the construction of the public or private blockchain makes SAGIN much more complicated.
Unlike public key cryptography, which is computational security, Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) is based on the uncertainty principle of quantum physics [
23]. QKD offers the ultimate solution: restoring security and confidentiality by resorting to unbreakable principles of nature [
24]. Discrete-Variable QKD (DVQKD) and Continuous-Variable QKD (CVQKD) are representative QKD protocols. The measurement-device-independent protocol has closed the critical side channels in the physical implementations, paving the way for secure DVQKD with realistic devices [
25]. CVQKD is based on coherent states or Gaussian modulation focuses on practical implementations [
26,
27,
28]. However, the complex equipment in QKD is not suitable for diverse terminals in SAGIN.
Regarding physical security, several authentication protocols based on Physical Unclonable Function (PUF) have been proposed [
29,
30,
31,
32,
33]. The inherent unclonable function makes PUF a physical one-way function suitable as physical security primitives [
34,
35]. The challenge–response pairs (CRPs) are exchanged in the registration procedure, and the authentication and key exchange protocols are formalized based on the CRPs. The attacker cannot simulate the correct CRPs without the registered PUF. However, in SAGIN, there are numerous terminals versus a certain number of satellites. It is not realistic to store all the CRPs of all the terminals in one satellite, let alone the handover situation of the satellites.
Semiconductor superlattice (SSL) is a strong PUF that consists of two different materials [
36]. Generally speaking, SSL is employed in authentication or random number generation.
Besides, the chaos synchronization between unclonable matched superlattice pairs in the same wafer was discovered. A long-haul public-channel secure key distribution was experimentally demonstrated based on matched SSL pairs [
37,
38]. Matched SSL pairs can also be employed to distribute symmetric keys even if in different locations, such as Beijing and Changsha. Furthermore, the full entropy keys can be distributed through an insecure public channel, greatly reducing the complexity of key distribution and management.
In conclusion, a public key over the elliptic curve achieves dynamic access for SAGIN. However, it is more time-consuming than a lightweight authentication scheme based on a pre-shared symmetric key. However, how to achieve secure and convenient symmetric key distribution and management is a relatively difficult problem, especially in high mobility SAGIN. SSL PUF is suitable to protect from a physical attack. Furthermore, the matched SSL pairs are a novel scheme for unconditional key distribution dynamically through a public channel. The SSL-based access authentication and key distribution scheme is proposed for SAGIN. The major contributions of this paper are described below:
A system model for access and key distribution based on SSL PUF is proposed. In the system model, various terminals are equipped with regular SSL chips. Meanwhile, satellites and the ground server are equipped with matched SSL pairs. The inherent security of SSL makes the authentication and key distribution spontaneously achieved without a key management burden and solves the assumption that excellent performance is based on pre-shared symmetric keys.
Access authentication and handover authentication schemes are proposed, which achieve mutual access authentication and unconditionally secure key distribution. The protocol maintains a lower cost and communication overhead by employing basic hash/hmac operations and symmetric encryption.
The proposed scheme achieves intended authentication, confidentiality, integrity, and forward security, which can defend against masquerade attacks, replay attacks, and man-in-the-middle attacks. The informal security analysis substantiates the security goal.
The performance evaluation results confirm that the proposed protocols have an obvious advantage over the elliptic curve or bilinear pairings-based protocols. Compared with the protocols based on a pre-distributed symmetric key, our scheme shows unconditional security and dynamic key management versus a somewhat weaker performance.
In
Section 2, background on the SSL is introduced.
Section 3 describes the system model and security goals. The proposed scheme is illustrated in
Section 4, and the security analysis is given in
Section 5. Performance evaluation is in
Section 6. The conclusion is the final part of
Section 7.
4. The Proposed Scheme
The proposed scheme consists of three participants: terminal
, satellites
, and ground server
. The scheme is divided into three phases: terminal registration, authentication, and handover.
Table 1 shows the notations used in this paper.
and
are the same
, and are distinguished for easy understanding.
4.1. Terminal Registration Phase
The most important work in the terminal’s registration phase is generating and storing the terminal’s CRPs in . It is assumed that the is in a safe environment, and the registration procedure is executed in a secret channel.
Let be the number of CRPs according to the application.
select a random number as the starting point of the challenge, , and save it in the database, then set the challenge , and send to terminal .
saves as a starting point of the challenge. Inspire the SSL PUF chip by , and get the response, . Then send to .
save to the database. Then calculate , and send new challenge, , to .
get the response, , of the challenge, , and return to .
Execute step (3)~step (4) iteratively to get all groups CRPs.
Finally, saves the initial value of challenge , and saves and groups CRPs of . is transmitted and stored instead of because the will keep the forward security of the scheme. Even if was stolen, the attacker would not get the correct response, , without the correct .
4.2. Authentication Phase
The access authentication phase consists of satellite access authentication and terminal access authentication. The satellite access authentication realizes the secure key distribution based on matched SSL pairs, and the key buffer can be established in advance, reducing the communication overhead and improving efficiency. Terminal access authentication is implemented based on the common SSL. The procedures of the two phases are described below.
4.2.1. Satellite Access Authentication
Satellite
and ground server
are equipped with matched SSL pairs,
and
. The access authentication procedure is shown in
Figure 6.
set , and inputs it to the Sequence Synchronization module, which produces challenge signals continuously to . The BCH mode processes the output sequence, and the is generated. Finally, the privacy amplification module extracts the symmetric key, , from the output sequence. send to publicly.
checks the to verify the access authentication of the satellite and checks the to avoid a replay attack. Then, gets nearly the same output sequence through , recovered by the . The secret key is distributed after the privacy amplification module. sends message .
gets the message and checks by the secret key, , to confirm the key distribution protocol.
The secret key, , can also be a large key buffer that can be prepared as soon as the system is started. Thus, the satellite access authentication procedure will not cost much regarding calculation and communication consumption.
4.2.2. Terminal Access Authentication
In the terminal access authentication protocol, an SSL PUF chip is equipped in terminal
, and its CRPs are stored in the ground server
in the registration procedure.
serves as a transmitter in the protocol.
and
are the same ones, called
in short. The
and
have established a secret channel before the terminal access authentication.
Figure 7 shows the detailed processes.
Terminal finds the starting point of challenge , sets , and updates . Then, it inspires by challenge, , and gets the response, , error correct code, . Then, is extracted from the response, . The terminal sends a message to the satellite, .
The satellite checks the first to avoid a replay attack. Let message . Satellite sends to the .
The ground server,
, verifies
with
first, and then checks the
to avoid a replay attack.
and
are checked if they were registered. Then, the pre-stored (
was indexed by
, and
between
and
is extracted according to
Figure 3 with ECC,
. Mark the index
to avoid a replay attack.
The ground server, , generates a random number as the session key and gets the . Let message ). Let message ). sends to Satellite .
Satellite checks and first. Then, is decrypted by , the integrity of ) is verified. gets the session key . Let . sends to terminal .
Terminal checks and first. Then, decrypts with and gets the session key . Then, is verified with . Terminal access authentication and key distributed are verified.
4.3. Handover Authentication Phase
Since the satellites are switching around in the air space, the handover authentication is considered to provide continuous network service to terminals on the ground [
8,
12]. A pre-switch handover authentication protocol is proposed based on the SSL, as
Figure 8 shows. Terminal
can accomplish the pre-switch procedure before the handover switch so that the communication service is switched smoothly.
When the terminal, , inspects that the satellite, , is going away from the service coverage, it sends a pre-switch request to . Let . Sends message .
verifies with , then checks , and . Then, sends .
The ground server, , verifies with . Then checks , and . Next, calculates the next satellite, , to server the terminal . generates a new session key, , randomly. Let Then, it sends to .
checks and, and decrypts with . Then, it verifies . Let . A confirmation message || is sent back to .
verifies and sends || to where .
verifies and sends || to terminal .
Terminal, , verifies with KTSi, checks and , decrypts with , and verifies. . The pre-switch protocol is finished.