Preserving User Anonymity in Context-Aware Location-Based Services: A Proposed Framework

ETRI Journal

关键词: k-anonymity;    context-aware;    privacy;    anonymity;    location-based services;    Trusted third party;   

Others  :  1196682
DOI  :  10.4218/etrij.13.0112.0327

【 摘 要 】

Protecting privacy is an important goal in designing location-based services. Service providers want to verify legitimate users and allow permitted users to enjoy their services. Users, however, want to preserve their privacy and prevent tracking. In this paper, a new framework providing users with more privacy and anonymity in both the authentication process and the querying process is proposed. Unlike the designs proposed in previous works, our framework benefits from a combination of three important techniques: k-anonymity, timed fuzzy logic, and a one-way hash function. Modifying and adapting these existing schemes provides us with a simpler, less complex, yet more mature solution. During authentication, the one-way hash function provides users with more privacy by using fingerprints of users' identities. To provide anonymous authentication, the concept of confidence level is adopted with timed fuzzy logic. Regarding location privacy, spatial k-anonymity prevents the users’ locations from being tracked. The experiment results and analysis show that our framework can strengthen the protection of anonymity and privacy of users by incurring a minimal implementation cost and can improve functionality.

   

【 参考文献 】

• [1]C.-Y. Chow and M.F. Mokbel, "Privacy in Location-Based Services: A System Architecture Perspective," SIGSPATIAL, Special Issue, vol. 1, no. 2, 2009, pp. 23-27.
• [2]T.H.N. Vu, J.W. Lee, and K.H. Ryu, "Spatiotemporal Pattern Mining Technique for Location-Based Service System," ETRI J., vol. 30, no. 3, June 2008, pp. 421-431.
• [3]C. O'Driscoll, "Privacy in Context: Privacy Issues in Ubiquitous Computing Applications," Proc. ICDM, 2008, pp. 827-837.
• [4]M.F. Mokbel, "Privacy in Location-Based Services: State-of-the-Art and Research Directions," Proc. MDM, 2007, p. 228.
• [5]J.L. Wang and M.C. Loui, "Privacy and Ethical Issues in Location-Based Tracking Systems," Proc. ISTAS, 2009.
• [6]H. Truong and S. Dustdar, "A Survey on Context-Aware Web Service Systems," IJWIS J., vol. 5, 2009.
• [7]A. Moon et al., "Context-Aware Active Services in Ubiquitous Computing Environments," ETRI J, vol. 29, no. 2, 2007, pp. 169-178.
• [8]A.M. Bernardos, P. Tarrio, and J.R. Casar, "A Data Fusion Framework for Context-Aware Mobile Services," Proc. MFI, 2008.
• [9]T.C. Wang, G. Jia, and J. Huang, "Toward Context-Aware Location Based Services," Proc. ICEIE, 2010.
• [10]S. Martin et al., "A Context-Aware Application Based on Ubiquitous Location," Proc. UBICOMM, 2008, pp. 83-88.
• [11]M. Nonjur, S.I. Ahamed, and C.S. Hasan, "ELALPS: A Framework to Eliminate Location Anonymizer from Location Privacy Systems," Proc. COMPSAC, 2009.
• [12]D. Sambandaraksa, "Privacy a Double-Edged Sword," Bangkok Post., Oct. 13, 2010. http://www.bangkokpost.com/tech/techscoop/201103/privacy-a-double-edged-sword
• [13]W. Zhang et al., "The Location Privacy Protection Research in Location-Based Service," Proc. GEOINFORMATICS, 2010, pp. 1-4.
• [14]T. Hashem and L. Kulik, "Safeguarding Location Privacy in Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks," Proc. UbiComp, 2007, pp. 372-390.
• [15]S. Wang and X.S. Wang, "In-Device Spatial Cloaking for Mobile User Privacy Assisted by the Cloud," Proc. MDM, 2010, pp. 381-386.
• [16]Z. Gong, G.-Z. Sun, and X. Xie, "Protecting Privacy in Location-Based Services Using k-Anonymity without Cloaked Region," Proc. MDM, 2010, pp. 366-371.
• [17]C. Bettini et al., "Anonymity in Location-Based Services: Towards a General Framework," Proc. MDM, 2007, pp. 69-76.
• [18]Z.-J. Zhang, Z.-J. Wang, and B.-H. Zhang, "Studies on Median Value of Fuzzy Numbers Based on Confidence Level," Proc. ICMLC, 2008, pp. 588-593.
• [19]H. Li, S.H. Dick, and W. Pedrycz, "Similarity Confidence Level for Fuzzy Rulebases," Proc. NAFIPS, 2004, pp. 882-887.
• [20]B. Malek, A. Miri, and A. Karmouch, "A Framework for Context-Aware Authentication," Proc. IET, 2008.
• [21]A.H.M. Ragab, N.A. Ismail, and O.S.F. Allah, "An Efficient Message Digest Algorithm (MD) for Data Security," Proc. TENCON, 2001, pp. 191-197.
• [22]X.-H. Cheng and J.-Z. Deng, "Design of SHA-1 Algorithm Based on FPGA," Proc. NSWCTC, 2010, pp. 532-534.
• [23]P. Kitsos and O. Koufopavlou, "Whirlpool Hash Function: Architecture and VLSI Implementation," Proc. ISCAS, 2004.