Distributed SSO with Secret Sharing and Proactive Updates
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional distributed single sign-on (SSO) technologies are vulnerable to active attacks, particularly in untrusted environments like the Internet, where a compromised authentication server can send incorrect partial tickets, leading to denial of access and security issues due to the storage of credentials and profiles.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of a distributed SSO system that splits secret keys and user profiles into secure shares and periodically updates these shares among authentication servers without altering the underlying secrets, using threshold schemes and cryptographic methods to ensure security and prevent active attacks.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional distributed SSO technologies store credentials and profiles on authentication servers, then single sign-on functionality is enabled, but security is compromised when servers are attacked
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments credentials and profiles into multiple shares using secret sharing schemes. Each authentication server stores only a portion (share) of the credential or profile rather than the complete data. This segmentation ensures that no single server holds the full credential, making it difficult for attackers to compromise the entire system by attacking one server. The credential can only be reconstructed when a threshold number of shares are combined.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements nested structures where shares of credentials are embedded within tickets. Each ticket contains encrypted shares that are further nested within authentication protocols. This nested organization allows the system to maintain security layers - even if outer layers are compromised, inner nested shares remain protected and require additional authentication steps to access.
2Adaptability or versatility
If authentication servers return encrypted partial tickets to users, then distributed access control is achieved, but active attacks can produce incorrect tickets causing denial of access
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary verification mechanisms where authentication servers validate tickets before granting access. The system performs preliminary checks on the authenticity and integrity of partial tickets returned to users, detecting incorrect or tampered tickets before they can cause denial of access. This preliminary action prevents malicious tickets from successfully blocking legitimate users.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent incorporates feedback mechanisms where authentication servers monitor and verify ticket validity in real-time. When tickets are presented for access, the system provides feedback by verifying the ticket against stored shares and authentication state. This feedback loop allows the system to detect and reject incorrect tickets generated by active attacks, maintaining access availability for legitimate users.
3Reliability
If secret keys are split into shares distributed among authentication servers, then security is improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements universal secret sharing schemes that can be applied across multiple authentication servers and credential types using the same mathematical framework. The threshold secret sharing mechanism provides a universal approach that works for different credential formats and server configurations, reducing the need for separate complex implementations for each scenario while maintaining security.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes parameter-based secret sharing where the security properties are controlled by mathematical parameters (threshold values, share counts, cryptographic key sizes). By adjusting these parameters, the system can balance security requirements against computational and storage complexity. This parameterization allows flexible configuration without fundamentally changing the system architecture.
4Ease of operation
If credentials are stored on authentication servers, then user authentication is enabled, but privacy is compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts sensitive credential data from centralized storage on authentication servers and distributes it across multiple servers in encrypted shares. This extraction removes the concentrated privacy risk that existed when all credentials were stored on single or few servers. Users can authenticate through the distributed system without any single server having access to their complete profile information.
Data Source
AI summary
Technologies for distributed single sign-on operable to provide user access to a plurality of services via authentication to a single entity. The distributed single sign-on technologies provide a set of authentication servers and methods for privacy protection based on splitting secret keys and user profiles into secure shares and periodically updating shares among the authentication servers without affecting the underlying secrets. The correctness of the received partial token or partial profiles can be verified with non-interactive zero-knowledge proofs.