End-to-end security mechanisms for SMS
Jing-Shyang Hwu, Shih Feng Hsu, Yi Bing Lin, Rong Jaye Chen · International Journal of Security and Networks · 2006
In the mobile communication systems, security (encryption) offered by the network operator applies only on the wireless link. Data delivered through the mobile core network may not be protected. Existing end-to-end security mechanisms are provided at application level and typically based on public key cryptosystem. This paper introduces two encryption mechanisms based on the Rivest-Shamir-Adleman (RSA) scheme and the Identity-based (ID-based) scheme to provide end-to-end security for Short Message Service (SMS). We implement these two mechanisms over the standard SMS network architecture and estimate the encryption overhead. Our study indicates that the ID-based mechanism has advantages over the RSA mechanism in key distribution and scalability of increasing security level for mobile service.