A design of self-authenticated Internet Protocol for Network Access Control

This paper presents an application of Internet Protocol Options for enhancing self-authenticated feature to the Internet Protocol. The options consist of Keyed-Hash Message Authentication Code and timestamp. In the network access control system, local network devices needing to access protected networks have to attach the options to packet header before sending to destination through a network access controller or commonly known as a gateway. Internet Protocol packets with options are verified on the gateway, the Keyed-Hash Message Authentication Code is used for checking integrity of data and the timestamp is used for replay attack mitigation. Packets passing all processes would be allowed to access to the protected networks. The design of self-authenticated Internet Protocol provides a protection of sending source spoofed packets from local network causing damage to other networks and also provides high reliability of source identification.