Improved LTE-R Access Authentication Scheme Based on Blockchain and Secgear

High-speed railway (HSR) is developing toward automation and intelligence with the motivation of improved safety. The automatic train control system is deeply committed to HSR safety, and depends on long term evolution for railway (LTE-R). The authentication scheme is the primary contributor among all security measures to secure communication in LTE-R. We found vulnerabilities in the authentication mechanism used in LTE-R, such as key leakage, inability to resist privileged user attacks, and large authentication latency. To address these vulnerabilities, we propose a secure and efficient access authentication scheme for LTE-R. Unlike other studies, Our proposal capitalizes on the utilization of blockchain to establish a decentralized authentication system, effectively eliminating the single point of collapse vulnerability. Recognizing the public nature of the blockchain, we integrate the secgear framework to provide robust privacy protection measures. Furthermore, our scheme augments LTE-R access authentication by introducing a handover authentication phase and a password change phase, introducing additional security attributes for enhanced protection. In addition, we have conducted fleshed-out security analysis and simulation experiments, which show that our scheme is able to achieve privacy protection with acceptable efficiency.