Guarding the Guards: Accountable Authorities in VANETs

In this paper we present an approach to gaining increased anonymity from authorities within a VANET. Standardization organizations and researchers working on VANETs recognize privacy as highly important. However, most research focuses on privacy from other vehicles and external attackers, as opposed to privacy from system-administrating authorities. Our proposed solution forces authorities to resolve identities, i.e. de-anonymize vehicles, in public. It thereby creates a public log of identity resolutions and offers end-users a tool with which they can both validate the authorities’ reasons for resolving identities and measure the extent to which such power is exercized.