Efficient and Secure Device Clustering for Networked Home Domains

Virtual private community (VPC) architecture is a hierarchical domain structure for intuitively and securely sharing content with others without privacy invasion. To build a secure domain like a smart home using VPC, a certificate chain-based association (CCA) scheme was proposed. CCA is a secure device clustering method, which consists of a member authentication based on a hierarchical trust model and a secure enrollment process. Since CCA can be operated without using any external authentication systems, consumers can build private domains using their own devices from different vendors. However, CCA has several weak points, such as the absence of the root authentication of a hierarchical trust model, the absence of revocation management, and a high processing burden caused by a chain model. Such weak points cause various attacks/problems like a spoofing attack and time synchronization. Also, they can create bottleneck in the case of VPC with large numbers of devices. So, to practically implement VPC, CCA should be improved so that it will be a reliable and efficient trust mechanism. Hence, this paper proposes a member list chain and member reputation-based association (MLC- $\text{R}_{\mathrm {b}}\text{A}$ ) scheme. MLC- $\text{R}_{\mathrm {b}}\text{A}$ changes the type of authentication data, from a certificate to a list. Also, it proposes two necessary functions to authenticate the root of a hierarchical trust model without using an external trust authority and to control revoked members without causing user inconvenience and performance degradation. Additionally, to enhance a service performance, it proposes to use a domain hub device which is a representative entity publishing a valid membership status list. So it can solve time synchronization problem and a service bottleneck problem. Like CCA, MLC- $\text{R}_{\mathrm {b}}\text{A}$ is a local trust management scheme, which does not need any external specific authentication systems. Hence, using MLC- $\text{R}_{\mathrm {b}}\text{A}$ , consumers can make and manage their own domains using devices from different vendors, more securely and easily, but without performance degradation.