Navigating Privacy Challenges in Mission Critical Communication: Insights for 6G Networks

This paper explores privacy issues in mission critical communication (MCC), a vital yet under-explored area of research for mission critical services over cellular networks. MCC facilitates emergency services like police and fire brigade during critical incidents. Due to the limited data capacity and coverage of TETRA-based services, MCC over 4G and 5G cellular networks has emerged as an alternative. However, network operator involvement in MCC raises significant privacy concerns, for instance, disclosing a policeman's location. To our knowledge, no existing work considers privacy issues in MCC over cellular networks. Therefore, we analyze privacy challenges in 3GPP-standardized MCC architecture within the context of 5G core network concepts and emerging technologies to be introduced in 6G. Our goal is to guide future actions in developing a privacy-preserving MCC architecture for 6G. We assess privacy implications for MC users, network entities, and MC servers, adhering to MCC deployment strategies. Finally, we suggest privacy controls to establish a next-generation privacy-preserving MCC architecture.