On the RIS Manipulating Attack and Its Countermeasures in Physical-layer Key Generation

Hu, Lei; Li, Guyue; Luo, Hongyi; Hu, Aiqun

doi:10.1109/vtc2021-fall52928.2021.9625442

Cited by 16 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…In the context of disrupting wireless communications, Staat et al demonstrated how an RIS can disrupt Wi-Fi networks [21]. In the context of CRKG, we have partially investigated an example of the RIS jamming attack in our previous work [22]. However, its attack model is not general and no field verification has been provided.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Staat

et al. 2022

IEEE Wireless Commun.

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Channel Reciprocity-based Key Generation (CRKG) exploits reciprocal channel randomness to establish shared secret keys between wireless terminals. This new security technique is expected to complement existing cryptographic techniques for secret key distribution of future wireless networks. In this paper, we present a new attack, reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) jamming, and show that an attacker can prevent legitimate users from agreeing on the same key by deploying a malicious RIS to break channel reciprocity. Specifically, we elaborate on three examples to implement the RIS jamming attack: Using active nonreciprocal circuits, performing time-varying controls, and reducing the signal-to-noise ratio. The attack effect is then studied by formulating the secret key rate with a relationship to the deployment of RIS. To resist such RIS jamming attacks, we propose a countermeasure that exploits wideband signals for multipath separation. The malicious RIS path is distinguished from all separated channel paths, and thus the countermeasure is referred to as contaminated path removal-based CRKG (CRP-CRKG). We present simulation results, showing that legitimate users under RIS jamming are still able to generate secret keys from the remaining paths. We also experimentally demonstrate the RIS jamming attack by using commodity Wi-Fi devices in conjunction with a fabricated RIS prototype. In our experiments, we were able to increase the average bit disagreement ratio (BDR) of raw secret keys by 20%. Further, we successfully demonstrate the proposed CRP-CRKG countermeasure to tackle RIS jamming in wideband systems as long as the source of randomness and the RIS propagation paths are separable.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Staat

et al. 2022

IEEE Wireless Commun.

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“…This idea, referred to as countermeasure based on channel separation (CCS), can be implemented in PKG systems with high multipath resolution. For example, in a wideband OFDM system, these channels are separated through an inverse discrete Fourier transform (IDFT) and the RISinduced channel can be detected from its high variance [9]. Fig.…”

Section: ) Countermeasuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, RIS can take destructive as well as constructive roles, decided by who owns the control right. In [9], it has been shown that when a RIS is controlled by a malicious party, it could break the key agreement of legitimate parties. The potential destructive aspects of RIS are largely overlooked in existing works.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Li¹,

Hu²,

Staat³

et al. 2021

Preprint

Self Cite

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Physical layer key generation (PKG) is a promising means to provide on-the-fly shared secret keys by exploiting the intrinsic randomness of the radio channel. However, the performance of PKG is highly dependent on the propagation environments. Due to its feature of controlling the wireless environment, reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) is appealing to be applied in PKG. In this paper, in contrast to the existing literature, we investigate both the constructive and destructive effects of RIS on the PKG scheme. For the constructive aspect, we have identified static and wave-blockage environments as two RIS-empowered-PKG applications in future wireless systems. In particular, our experimental results in a static environment showed that RIS can enhance the entropy of the secret key, achieving a key generation rate (KGR) of 97.39 bit/s with a bit disagreement rate (BDR) of 0.083. In multi-user systems where some remote users are in worse channel conditions, the proposed RIS-assisted PKG algorithm improves the sum secret key rate by more than 2 dB, compared to the literature. Furthermore, we point out that RIS could be utilized by an attacker to perform new jamming and leakage attacks and give countermeasures, respectively. Finally, we outline future research directions for PKG systems in light of the RIS.

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“…The authors have proposed an optimization algorithm to maximize KGR by designing the RIS passive beamforming. Additionally, [35] and [36] view the RIS as an attacker to the PLKG schemes. In [35], after studying the constructive aspects of deploying RIS in PLKG, i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…in quasistatic and wave-blockage environments, the authors argue that an attacker can utilize the IRS to perform jamming and leakage attacks. Furthermore, the authors in [36], proposed an attack model in which an RIS reduces the wireless channel reciprocity by rapidly changing the RIS reflection coefficients in the uplink and downlink channel probing steps. A method to detect and counteract this attack is also proposed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconfigurable-Intelligent-Surface-Assisted Secret Key Generation Under Spatially Correlated Channels in Quasi-Static Environments

Shahiri,

Behroozi,

Kuhestani

et al. 2024

IEEE Internet Things J.

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Physical layer key generation (PLKG) can significantly enhance the security of classic encryption schemes by enabling them to change their secret keys significantly faster and more efficiently. However, due to the reliance of PLKG techniques on channel medium, reaching a high key generation rate (KGR) is challenging in quasi-static environments. Recently, exploiting reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) as a means to induce randomness in quasi-static wireless channels has received significant research interest. However, the impact of spatial correlation between the RIS elements is rarely studied. To be specific, for the first time, in this contribution, we take into account a spatially correlated RIS which intends to enhance the KGR in a quasi-static medium. Closed-form analytical expressions for KGR are derived for the two cases of random phase shift (RPS) and equal phase shift (EPS) in the RIS elements. We also analyze the temporal correlation between the channel samples to ensure the randomness of the generated secret key sequence. It is shown that the EPS scheme can effectively exploit the inherent spatial correlation between the RIS elements and it leads to a higher KGR compared to the widely used RPS strategy. We further formulate an optimization problem in which we determine the optimal portion of time dedicated to direct and indirect channel estimation within a coherence time. We show the accuracy and the fast convergence of our proposed sequential convex programming (SCP) based algorithm and discuss the various parameters affecting spatially correlated RIS-assisted PLKG.

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On the RIS Manipulating Attack and Its Countermeasures in Physical-layer Key Generation

Cited by 16 publications

References 9 publications

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface for Physical Layer Key Generation: Constructive or Destructive?

Reconfigurable-Intelligent-Surface-Assisted Secret Key Generation Under Spatially Correlated Channels in Quasi-Static Environments

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