MSc IS Thesis Proposal by POH Zhi Yuan | Attribute-Based Secure Messaging in the Cloud

Earlier messaging services like electronic mail (email), Short Message Service (SMS), etc. focus on functionalities over security. Messaging services without end-to-end message encryption reveal information to unauthorized users. Recent messaging services like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, etc. encrypt messages based on keys distributed via trusted servers. When distributed keys are changed by adversaries, messages might be obtained by unauthorized users. To protect confidentiality of messages, Attribute-Based Encryption (ABE) is a promising technology that can enhance the confidence of users in messaging services. ABE provides expressive and fine-grained access control based on user attributes and only users with matching attributes can obtain the original message. This proposal outlines the approach to design an attribute-based messaging system based on ABE. The design of the system aims to provide access control of messages, revoke users effectively and offload partial decryption to the cloud. Proposed prototypes demonstrate the support and performance of the messaging system on diverse range of platforms. Furthermore, prototypes are implemented based on Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) which is used widely to manage users and attributes.

POH Zhi Yuan is currently pursuing his MSc in the School of Information Systems (SIS) at SMU under the supervision of Professor Robert Deng. His research focuses on applied cryptography.