BFR-SE: A Blockchain-Based Fair and Reliable Searchable Encryption Scheme for IoT with Fine-Grained Access Control in Cloud Environment. (24th November 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Gao, Hongmin; Luo, Shoushan; Ma, Zhaofeng; Yan, Xiaodan; Xu, Yanping
• Other Names: Huang Yan Academic Editor.
• Is Part Of: Wireless communications and mobile computing. Volume 2021(2021)
• Publication Date: 2021-11-24
• Subjects: Wireless communication systems -- Periodicals; Mobile communication systems -- Periodicals; 621.38205
• DOI: 10.1155/2021/5340116
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1530-8669

Abstract

Abstract : Due to capacity limitations, large amounts of data generated by IoT devices are often stored on cloud servers. These data are usually encrypted to prevent the disclosure, which significantly affects the availability of this data. Searchable encryption (SE) allows a party to store his data created by his IoT devices or mobile in encryption on the cloud server to protect his privacy while retaining his ability to search for data. However, the general SE techniques are all pay-then-use. The searchable encryption service providers (SESP) are considered curious but honest, making it unfair and unreliable. To address these problems, we combined ciphertext-policy attribute-based encryption, Bloom filter, and blockchain to propose a blockchain-based fair and reliable searchable encryption scheme (BFR-SE) in this paper. In BFR-SE, we constructed an attribute-based searchable encryption model that can provide fine-grained access control. The data owner stores the indices on SESP and stores some additional auxiliary information on the blockchain. After a data user initiates a request, SESP must return the correct and integral search results before the deadline. Otherwise, the data user can send an arbitration request, and the blockchain will make a ruling. The blockchain will only perform arbitrations based on auxiliary information when disputes arise, saving the computing resources on-chain. We analyzed the security and privacy of BFR-SE and simulated our scheme on the EOS blockchain, which proves that BFR-SE is feasible. Meanwhile, we provided a thorough analysis of storage and computing overhead, proving that BFR-SE is practical and has good performance.