KeyBunch: A Novel Approach to Key Management

Information security is an indispensable requirement in any network environment. Compromising on security may lead to serious technical and social ill effects. Security is achieved by encryption and decryption of data. Traditionally a symmetric key is initially shared between the two communicating nodes via a public key cryptography. The session is then secured using the shared key for encryption and decryption of messages. However security of the system can be enhanced if the single shared key is replaced by a bunch of keys together with a mechanism to determine the sequence in which the keys are used. In this way, the session is not compromised just by cracking a single key and a high level of security is assured and number of communications involved between the two communicators in order to exchange the symmetric key is decreased. Our work explains the concept of keybunch, how it works, Protocol of key bunch exchange in unicast and multicast scenarios and resistance against attacks.