A lightweight post-quantum authentication framework for next-generation satellite communication standards

In this paper, a generic post-quantum authentication protocol is constructed for quantum-resistant satellite communication. This scheme was proposed to address emerging authentication needs in post-quantum satellite communication systems consistent with evolving standards such as Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS) and European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). In the proposed authentication, it is aimed to obtain additional security features and low communication complexity based on simple operations and post-quantum algorithms. The mutual authentication is achieved by using Physical Unclonable Functions (PUF), Hash Message Authentication Code (HMAC), and post-quantum cryptography (PQC) primitives. The security analysis shows that the proposed authentication provides additional security properties and resistance to replay and man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks. The main difference between the proposed protocol and PQC-based authentication for satellites in the literature is that it does not require complex operations and provides anonymity, integrity, and legitimacy with the help of lightweight principles. The proposed scheme leverages National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)-approved post-quantum cryptographic primitives (e.g., CRYSTALS-Kyber, HQC, SHA3-256), while the overall authentication protocol design is novel and constitutes the main contribution of our work.