Anonymous services: Enhancing end-user privacy exploiting anonymous networks

The large number of online services poses serious problems to users' privacy. The sole confidentiality of data exchanged is not enough for complete privacy because an external observer may learn sensitive information simply by observing the communication channel, even if it is not possible to access the actual data transmitted. In this position paper, we propose a solution where user privacy is guaranteed by providing anonymous access to the services. Our solution is based on a service gateway, an anonymous credential system, an authentication protocol and an anonymous network. We designed the solution to be cost-effective and scalable; moreover, we employ existing standard protocols whenever possible to facilitate development and deployment.