An Attribute-Based Distributed and Policy-Hidden Authorization Mechanism for Virtualized 5G Networks in Vertical Industries

The mobile communication network is gradually shifting from the deployment of dedicated physical facilities to the deployment of virtualized network functions on general infrastructure. Taking advantage of this transformation, operators can provide customized services to better meet the demands of vertical industries. However, the participation of vertical industry tenants introduces a new attack surface to the mobile networks. The centralized access control scheme currently employed in the 5G system has a high risk of single-point failure and privacy leakage. And it is inefficient when the scheme is applied in distributed core networks. To secure the mobile communication network and protect the privacy of vertical industry tenants, we propose a distributed policy-hidden (DPH) framework, which achieves flexible cross-trust-domain authorization with lower latency. Besides, Attribute-based Encryption is introduced to protect long-distance communications between network functions. Our evaluation demonstrates that DPH is suitable for virtualized 5G networks and effectively reduces the latency of authorization procedures.