Efficient and quantum-secure authenticated key exchange scheme for mobile satellite communication networks

The mobile satellite communication (MSC) system is a vital communication method in which mobile users and network control centers connect via satellites. Since the satellite's communication is wireless, communication security is a critical factor to ensure accountable communication. Key exchange and authentication (KEA) mechanism is widely used to achieve data security for data transmitted in an insecure or open channel. Different authentication systems are suggested in the last many years to establish safe communication, whereas most existing security protocols are based on factorization or discrete logarithm. However, these systems are no longer reliable by Shor's algorithm as any discrete logarithm and factorization can be resolved in polynomial time on quantum computers. Thus, developing a quantum secure KEA protocol for MSC systems is necessary. In this direction, recently a ring learning with an error-based KEA technique is proposed to ensure a quantum-safe environment. This scheme is quantum-safe and satisfies desirable security attributes but has low efficiency in computation and communication. Moreover, establishing a secure session requires six communications among involved entities. As a result, replay attack detection at an early stage is not possible for the central authority (server), which could delay the server response, and the adversary gets the advantage of drawing a denial of service scenario for authorized entities. We propose a lattice-based KEA protocol for the MSC system to improve computation, communication efficiency, and early-stage replay attack detection. The security analysis of the proposed scheme is presented in the random oracle model. Calculation of performance is also presented to observe advantages in computation and communication overhead.