Improved one-pass IMS authentication in UMTS

Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), as a core network can support both circuit-switch as well as packet-switch networks. UMTS supports IP Multimedia services by including the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) as part of its core network. IMS services are used by authenticating user equipment with the UMTS using UMTS AKA and then with the IMS using IMS AKA. This paper concentrates on the IMS authentication and proposes an improved one-pass IMS authentication procedure which will result in reduction in message delivery cost and improvement over IMS AKA. This proposed procedure also preserves security features such as mutual authentication and key agreement expected from an IMS authentication procedure.