Location-aware sign-on and key exchange using attribute-based encryption and Bluetooth beacons

TL;DR

This paper introduces a location-aware mobile sign-on system that leverages Bluetooth beacons and attribute-based encryption to enable seamless, attribute-driven authentication across multiple locations.

Contribution

It proposes a novel combination of Bluetooth beacons and attribute-based encryption for expressive, broadcast-style key exchange in mobile sign-on scenarios.

Findings

Enables location-aware sign-on using Bluetooth beacons.

Allows attribute-based access control for decryption.

Supports seamless user authentication across locations.

Abstract

This work presents a mobile sign-on scheme, which utilizes Bluetooth Low Energy beacons for location awareness and Attribute-Based Encryption for expressive, broadcast-style key exchange. Bluetooth Low Energy beacons broadcast encrypted messages with encoded access policies. Within range of the beacons, a user with appropriate attributes is able to decrypt the broadcast message and obtain parameters that allow the user to perform a short or simplified login. The effect is a "traveling" sign-on that accompanies the user throughout different locations.