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IEEE Wireless Communications Letters

Key Error Rates in Physical Layer Key Generation: Theoretical Analysis and Measurement-Based Verification

Ozan Alp Topal, Güneş Karabulut Kurt, Berna Özbek

Published Aug 15, 2017• 25 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Channel gains are frequently used to obtain a secret key that can be used for encryption in physical layer security systems. However, the channel gains captured by the nodes may not always be the same due to channel estimation errors. This would result in a non-zero key error rate (KER). In this letter, we obtain theoretical expressions for KER in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing systems. Tight KER approximations are provided based on Gauss-Laguerre quadrature. A measurement-based study is conducted by using software defined radio nodes to demonstrate the validity and the practicality of the provided results.

DOI
10.1109/lwc.2017.2740290

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Channel gains are frequently used to obtain a secret key that can be used for encryption in physical layer security systems. However, the channel gains captured by the nodes may not always be the same due to channel estimation errors. This would result in a non-zero key error rate (KER). In this letter, we obtain theoretical expressions for KER in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing systems. Tight KER approximations are provided based on Gauss-Laguerre quadrature. A measurement-based study is conducted by using software defined radio nodes to demonstrate the validity and the practicality of the provided results.
For the physical layer (PHY) key generation, two distant nodes exploit the reciprocal channel coefficients as a shared secret. These nodes may obtain erroneous channel estimates and generate highly correlated but not identical secret keys. In this work, we analyze the key error rate (KER) performances when different wavelet families are utilized as a pre-processing step in PHY key generation. Measurement-based KER results show that selection of the wavelet can significantly change the performance.
Physical layer key generation from the wireless channel is an emerging area of interest to provide confidentiality and authentication. One of the main challenges in this domain is to increase the length of the generated secret key while maintaining its randomness and uniformity. In this letter, new dimensions for wireless channel-based key generation are proposed for orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems. The novel perspective of the proposed work lies in the generation of key bits not only from the magnitudes of OFDM subchannels as it has conventionally been done but also from the number and positions/indices of those subchannels, whose channel gains are above the mean of the respective subblock. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithms is evaluated in terms of key generation rate and key mismatch rate. It is shown in the simulation results that the involvement of the proposed dimensions can double the key generation rate compared to conventional algorithms.
In this paper, a novel physical layer key generation method for extracting secret key from mutual channel information in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems has been proposed. Firstly, a well-designed data extraction process has been introduced to reduce the redundancy and inconsistency of channel state information (CSI). After that, a new quantization method using gray code is proposed. Furthermore, an associated method is designed to reduce key error rate (KER). With these improvements, higher key generation rate (KGR) can be obtained compared to existing methods. Finally, available secret keys have been generated after information reconciliation and privacy amplification. The proposed method has been analyzed and verified in long term evolution advanced (LTE-A) systems and the generated secret keys have passed randomness test.
In this letter, novel algorithms for secret key generation from the wireless channel in multi-carrier systems are proposed for ensuring the confidentiality and authentication in wireless communication systems. The novelty of the proposed algorithms lies in the generation of random secret bits not just from the magnitudes of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) subchannels as it has conventionally been done in the literature, but also from the indices/positions of the subchannels corresponding to highest gains. Thus, the proposed algorithms provide additional dimensions for enhancing overall key rates. The efficiency of the proposed algorithms is evaluated in terms of key mismatch rate (KMR) and key generation rate (KGR). Simulation results showed that the proposed algorithms can enhance the overall performance of physical layer key-based algorithms by providing extra dimensions for secret key generation.
As aspects of our daily lives become more interconnected with the emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT), it is imperative that our devices are reliable and secure from threats. Vulnerabilities of Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA/WPA2) have been exposed in the past, motivating the use of multiple security techniques, even with the release of WPA3. Physical layer security leverages existing components of communication systems to enable methods of protecting devices that are well-suited for IoT applications. In this work, we provide a low-complexity technique for generating secret keys at the Physical layer to enable improved IoT security. We leverage the existing carrier frequency offset (CFO) and channel estimation components of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) receivers for an efficient approach. The key generation algorithm we propose focuses on the unique CFO and channel experienced between a pair of desired nodes, and to the best of our understanding, the combination of the features has not been examined previously for the purpose of secret key generation. Our techniques are appropriate for IoT devices, as they do not require extensive processing capabilities and are based on second order statistics. We obtain experimental results using USRP N210 software defined radios and analyze the performance of our methods in post-processing. Our techniques improve the capability of desired nodes to establish matching secret keys, while hindering the threat of an eavesdropper, and are useful for protecting future IoT devices.
Physical layer secret key generation techniques have spurred much recent research interest. In general, the secret key establishment contains four main procedures: channel sounding, quantization, information reconciliation and privacy amplification. However, to overcome the non- reciprocity and correlation problems in key generation from orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) channels, a preprocessing procedure is added to prepare inputs for quantization. This paper demonstrates the optimal preprocessing approach in secret key generation and addresses its practical problems in realization. More specifically, we first build the mathematical model of a preprocessing procedure. Then, we identify that principle component analysis (PCA) can achieve the optimal performance in this model from the perspective of secret key capacity. Next, we discuss the realization steps of PCA algorithm and the corresponding procedures to cooperate with it. The parameter design in matrix partitioning and covariance matrix calculation are also analyzed. Numerical results verify that the proposed PCA preprocessing outperforms other tall unitary transforms and thus, it can be used to generate secret key with high key generation rate (KGR), low key error rate (KER) and good randomness.