Identity-based security systems for vehicular ad-hoc networks

Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) based on vehicular car to car ad-hoc networks have been extensively investigated by the research community and industry to improve efficiency and safety in road traffic. The management and control of the vehicular ad-hoc network (VANET) is still one of the most challenging research fields in the networking domain. In particular, security and privacy protection are very important requirements for the design of VANETs. The potential high dynamicity of VANETs and the need for flexibility and scalability in ITS applications supports the research for new security frameworks and the application of novel cryptographic schemes that ensure authentication, integrity and confidentiality given the constrained computational environment in which such applications usually operate. This paper investigates the application of identity based (id-based, for short) cryptographic (IBC) scheme (in particular, signature schemes) to provide better security and privacy for VANET. Along with a presentation of the state-of-the-art in this area, this paper presents a security framework for car-to-car VANETs based on a protocol for the distributed generation of signing keys that overcome key escrow issues.