Empowering Seamless Handover Authentication for High-speed UEs via Dual-blockchain over STINs

Satellite-terrestrial integrated networks (STINs) offer wide coverage and ubiquitous connectivity for massive mobile equipments (UEs). However, the security issues in STINs should not be ignored. Authentication and key agreement is the fundamental way to protect STINs from unauthorized access. Nevertheless, high-speed UEs, such as those in vehicles and trains, may encounter frequent handovers among heterogeneous access points in STINs, resulting in reduced authentication efficiency and an increased rate of access failures. To tackle these challenging issues, this paper proposes DBC-Auth, a seamless and universal handover authentication scheme that relies on a dual-blockchain architecture supporting all handover scenarios over STINs. Specifically, the proposed dual-blockchain architecture involves two chains that reside on the ground base stations and satellites, respectively, to efficiently manage the handover authentication in different segments of STINs. Leveraging the blockchain’s global availability and tamper-resistance, the authentication receipts can be recorded on the blockchain in advance, which can significantly improve the handover authentication efficiency and alleviate the handover failures. Security analysis demonstrates that our scheme achieves various security requirements, and performance evaluation shows superior efficiency compared to existing works.