Securing Health Monitoring via Body-Centric Time-Frequency Signature Authorization

• Published in: IEEE internet of things journal Vol. 8; no. 6; pp. 4711 - 4722
• Main Authors: Zhao, Nan, Zhang, Zhiya, Yang, Xiaodong, Ren, Aifeng, Zhao, Jianxun, Rehman, Masood Ur
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway IEEE 15.03.2021; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Authentication; Authorization; Body-centric communications; bornprint; Communication system security; Dielectric properties; Frequency domain analysis; Millimeter waves; mobile health; Perturbation; Physical layer; Remote monitoring; Security; signature authorization; subject specific; Time-frequency analysis; Wireless communication
• ISSN: 2327-4662; 2327-4662
• DOI: 10.1109/JIOT.2020.3029075

Identity-based attacks serve as the basis of an intruder's attempt to launch security infringements in mobile health monitoring scenarios. Wireless channel perturbations due to the presence of human body are a relative phenomenon depending heavily on the subject's dielectric properties. A new body-centric signature authorization (B-CSAI) approach based on time-frequency domain characteristics was proposed. This method utilizes multiple millimeter wave bands of 27-28 GHz, 29-30 GHz, and 31-32 GHz, thereby enhancing the security in body-centric communications exploiting benefits of subject specific channel signature. The proposed bornprint method is based on the intrinsic identity-related time-frequency domain information, which generated by the user's natural hand motion signature and resulting creeping waves and space waves. It can meet the unconditional keyless authorization requirements. A detailed measurement campaign considering radiation efficiency (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">\bar {\eta }({\mathrm{ dB}}) = -25.8, -24.7, -26.4 </tex-math></inline-formula>), path-loss exponent, and shadowing factor in three millimeter wave bands, using six human subjects confirm the usability and efficiency of the proposed approach. This also shows that there is a wide space for realizing security from physical mechanisms.