A hierarchical key management scheme for authentication of roaming mobile nodes between domains in mobile networks

Abstract

This letter proposes a hierarchical key management scheme based on hash key chain for authentication of roaming mobile nodes in both intra-domain and inter-domain. The key management scheme uses a local master key concept for reducing the latency of the authentication procedure and the communication overhead between a home authentication server and an access point in the foreign domain. The proposed scheme also supports secure separation of the authentication key among local authentication servers using hash key chain.