Introduction

Nowadays highly confidentaial data such as personal genetic information are stored in data centers and storage area networks. In these systems, information leakage to a system provider and attackers on the storage servers is the most likely risk and when happened, it causes serious damage to data owners. Security of such data should be tightly protected not only in storage for a long period of time but also in data transmission between the storage servers, which should often be located in distant places for robust site diversity. Confidentiality of data in storage is usually guaranteed by encrypting them. Some recent cryptographic schemes enable a data owner to search over encrypted data or process data without decryption1,2. Especially, lattice-based cryptography3,4,5,6 attracts attention due to its resistance against quantum algorithms7 and provable security under some worst case hardness assumptions. However, evaluation on the security of lattice-based cryptography is an ongoing task. For example, NTRU lattice cryptography which has been standardized at IEEE in 20098 is threatened by the newly developed efficient attack algorithm9 and needs to be re-evaluated on the security level.

In contrast, Shamir’s secret sharing (SS) scheme10 can realize information theoretically secure storage systems, if data-transmission and authentication in the systems could be performed somehow in an information theoretically secure way. Some protocols based on SS further allow processing of shared data without reconstruction11. Practical implementations of data-transmission and user authentication with information theoretical security (ITS) are, however, not easy at all. The only the known way for data-transmission with ITS is to use one-time pad (OTP) with a truly random number key stream, which can be shared either by trusted couriers or quantum key distribution (QKD)12. As for message and user authentication, the Wegman-Carter scheme13 can be used to ensure ITS, but the data owner has to employ pre-shared keys for each storage server and spend them in the OTP manner. It requires frequent key sharing and rigorous key management. So in practice, most data storage services adopt an easier way, i.e., password authentication for on-line individual identifications due to its high usability. If the data owner registers the same password to all storage servers, attackers who can access at least one storage server is able to easily know the password and then access all the storage servers. Even if only hashed password is stored, a powerful malicious insider who can access a password file in a storage server may guess the password with an off-line dictionary attack. That is, by hashing all possible passwords and comparing with the registered hash value, the malicious insider can find out the correct password without making authentication transaction. To attain ITS against the malicious insider’s off-line dictionary attacks, different passwords should be used for different storage servers at each time. So the data owner has to remember many passwords and hence often tends to reuse a password or employ easy passwords, which introduces the vulnerability against an on-line dictionary attack even if the number of attack trials is limited. Although password-authenticated SS schemes14,15 based on homomorphic encryption use a single password and have high tolerance even against off-line dictionary attacks, they so far offer only computational security16.

Since critical data which should be securely stored for long periods of time are rapidly increasing, demands for an unbreakable distributed storage system ensured by ITS are increasing. If information theoretically secure password-authentication protocol could be implemented, it would be beneficial to SS schemes. To our best knowledge, however, such a storage system has never been proposed and demonstrated so far.

Here we newly develop and demonstrate an efficient information theoretically secure distributed storage system by combining quantum key distribution and password-authenticated secret sharing. In our system, ITS in user authentication can be realized by embedding a single-password authentication mechanism into the reconstruction process of an SS scheme, while ITS message authentication is ensured by the Wegman-Carter scheme. ITS in data transmission can be realized by using OTP with random number key streams supplied from “the QKD platform17”. The whole system operates by the interplay between the QKD platform and the application layer on it, in which password-authenticated secret sharing is implemented. Moreover, we show how the QKD platform is designed in a layer structure for high serviceability and availability of the secure storage system.

Method

Information-theoretically secure password-authenticated SS scheme

Our newly proposed password-authenticated secret sharing scheme is based on Shamir’s SS scheme. In the original Shamir’s SS scheme, secret data D is divided into n pieces of shares fD(a1), fD(a2), …, fD(an), where fD is a random polynomial of degree at most k − 1 with a free coefficient representing the secret data D itself and a1, a2, …, an are public values. Then, knowledge of any k or more pieces of fD(ai) makes D easily computable with Lagrange interpolation. For example, to determine the free coefficient D in the quadratic function fD(x), at least three shares are required because there are three unknown parameters in the quadratic function fD(x). On the other hand, knowledge of any k − 1 or fewer pieces of fD(ai) leaves D completely undetermined (in the sense that all its possible values are equally likely). That is, the attacker cannot recover the original data from less than the threshold k of shares even by using unlimited computational resources. Such a scheme is called (k, n)-threshold scheme. This enables secret calculations (addition and multiplication). In fact becomes a share of addition of two secret data D(1) and D(2). Likewise, is used as the share of D(1) × D(2). In multiplying process, however, the degree of the polynomial is 2k − 2. So, 2k − 1 of shares are necessary to reconstruct D(1) × D(2).

Now we describe our password-authenticated secret sharing scheme. It comprises three phases: (1) Registration phase in which data shares and password shares are computed and stored in the storage servers; (2) Pre-computation and communication phase in which each storage server generates a random number by a physical random number generator and computes their shares, as well as prepares shares of the data “0” with another random number for confidentiality of the share in data reconstruction without changing the value of data share. Then all the storage servers send the shares to each other; (3) Data reconstruction phase in which the data owner requests the storage servers to send back the data shares using the password (request-response). If the password is correct, then the original data is reconstructed.

In these phases, all communications between the data owner machine and the storage servers and among the storage servers are to be OTP-encrypted by the keys supplied from the QKD platform. Thus ITS in data transmission can be ensured.

As for ITS in user authentication, the mechanism is as follows. The required task is to prevent an attacker from collecting knowledge nothing more than obtained by the on-line dictionary attack. In our scheme, this is realized by randomizing the responses from the storage servers by masking the data shares with the random numbers generated in Pre-computation and communication phase which should be discarded at each request-response. Only the correct password can cancel out this masking and any wrong password cannot unmask the secret data. ITS in message authentication is ensured by the Wegman-Carter scheme.

A detailed procedure is exemplified below in the case where there are four storage servers (n = 4) denoted as 1, 2, 3 and 4 and we assume that an attacker can corrupt at most one storage server. In this case, the secret data D are shared by the (3, 4)-threshold scheme. On the other hand, the password shares must be generated by using the (2, 4)-threshold scheme due to the multiplying process. This case suffices the demonstration of the principle of the information theoretically secure distributed storage. The schematic is shown in Fig. 1. All calculations are made in a finite Galois field with prime order q. The q should be large enough for security, since the number of possible passwords is q at most. We take q from Mersenne primes, because they have a suitable form q = 2m − 1 for calculations in the finite field. In our case, m is chosen in a range of 103–105.

Figure 1
figure 1

Schematic diagram of distributed storage with quantum key distribution and password-authenticated secret sharing scheme.

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(1) Registration phase

(1-1) Since each calculation in the finite field with prime order q = 2m − 1 can deal with only blocks of length at most m − 1 bits, secret data D, which has generally a much longer length, needs to be divided into pieces of (m − 1)-bit block, say l pieces; . The data owner sets a (m − 1)-bit password P, which should have sufficient entropy against the on-line dictionary attack, then computes a message authentication code, , which is denoted as Dl+1 and finally adds it to the data for later purpose of message authentication.

(1-2) For each data block, data shares , , , are created for storage server 1, 2, 3 and 4, respectively, by using polynomial of degree at most 2, where i = 1, …, l + 1. Password shares fP(1), fP(2), fP(3), fP(4) are created by using polynomial fP of degree at most 1.

(1-3) They are then sent to the corresponding storage servers.

(1-4) Each server stores the set of shares.

(2) Pre-computation and communication phase

(2-1) Each server generates a random number, denoted as Rj for the j-th storage server and makes its shares by using polynomial of degree at most 1. Furthermore each server generates shares of the “0” f0j(1), f0j(2), f0j(3), f0j(4) by using polynomial f0j of degree at most 2, such that f0j(0) = 0 should hold so as to keep confidentiality of the share in data reconstruction phase without changing the value of the data share.

(2-2) The storage servers send these shares to each other.

(2-3) Each server receives three shares of three random numbers and three shares of the “0,” and stores them together with the ones produced by itself.

For ITS, the above procedure has to be iterated l + 1 times before each data reconstruction of l blocks secret data. That is, j-th storage server has to keep l + 1 sets of ( fR1(j), fR2(j), fR3(j), fR4( j), f01( j), f02( j), f03( j), f04( j)).

(3) Data reconstruction phase

Let P′ be the password in the data owner’s memory.

(3-1) The data owner chooses three storage servers among the four. We may assume that they are storage server 1, 2 and 3 without loss of generality, denoting them as a set L = {1, 2, 3}.

(3-2) The data owner generates shares of P′, fP′(1), fP′(2), fP′(3) by using polynomial fP′ of degree at most 1.

(3-3) Eachset(L, fP′(j)) is sent to each corresponding storage server (request).

(3-4) If |L| ≠ 3, the request is rejected regarding it as an improper request. Otherwise, for each data block, each server, say j-th one, computes R = fR1(j) + fR2(j) + fR3(j), Z = f01(j) + f02(j) + f03(j) and

The () are then sent to the data owner (response). Here note that R and Z should be discarded at each request-response for ITS.

(3-5) For each data block, the data owner finds polynomial Fi(x) of degree 2 that satisfies Fi(j) = Fji for all j. Fi(0) is the reconstructed block.

(3-6) The data owner calculates MAC from F1(0), …, Fl(0) as in the first phase. If Fl  + 1(0) is equal to calculated MAC, the data owner successfully reconstructs the secret data D.

In general, the number of servers n and the (expected) maximum number of corrupted servers t, can be set arbitrarily provided as n ≥ 2t + 1 is met. In such a general case, the degree of polynomial fP, fRj and fP′ are t, while that of and f0j are 2t and the number of chosen servers |L| is 2t + 1. The number of servers should be set considering with cost and the risk of information leakage in each storage server.

In step (3-5), holds. Therefore, if P′ = P (namely fP(0) = fP′(0)), Fi(0) = Di holds. In this way, by using responses from 2t + 1 of n servers, the data owner decodes the secret data D. On the other hand, the responses do never leak any information about D if P′ ≠ P, since they are masked by fRj and f0j. More precisely, we can prove the following three facts; (i) if t corrupted storage servers jointly try to forge the reconstructed data by active attacks on the protocol, the data owner can detect it with probability (1 − l/q) if P is chosen randomly, or equivalently the MAC can be forged with the probability of l/q, (ii) the total information which t corrupted storage servers can see in the protocol is independent from the data owner’s password P and stored secret data D, if the other servers and the data owner are honest, (iii) even if an attacker first corrupts t of storage servers, then participates in Data reconstruction phase pretending to be a data owner by utilizing the corrupted servers, the total information which the attacker can obtain is no information other than whether the guessed password P′ is equal to the correct password P or not. Note that a guessed password P′ can be uniquely determined from values received by honest storage servers, even if the attacker pretends to be a data owner and sends random numbers in step (3-3) instead of fP′(j) computed from a certain P′. Similar to the normal SS scheme, if the number of corrupted servers exceeds t, the confidentiality of the secret data cannot be guaranteed.(See Supplemental information for the detail).

Structure of the whole system

To realize the scheme described above in a practical form, we adopt a layer architecture consisting of two blocks as shown in Fig. 2, namely the application layer on which the password-authenticated secret sharing scheme is implemented and the QKD platform17 which works as a secure key supply infrastructure. The data owner and the storage servers request random number keys to the QKD platform in every appropriate phase and get them in an appropriate file format of key streams.

Figure 2
figure 2

Schematic view of the layer structure of our distributed storage system.

The whole system consists of two blocks, the application layer and the QKD platform. The QKD platform further consists of the two layers, the quantum layer and the key management layer, working as a secure key supply infrastructure. The password-authenticated secret sharing scheme is implemented in the application layer on which the data owner and the storage servers (STSs) are setup. In the QKD platform, the keys are generated in each QKD link in the quantum layer, pushed up to key management agents (KMAs) in the key management layer. The KMAs are in the trusted key relay nodes, store the keys and if necessary, relay the keys. To support various applications, key supply agents (KSAs) are introduced at each KMA. In the key management layer, a key management server (KMS) is also located and carry out the centralized key management. Having requests from the data owner and the storage servers, the KSAs supply them the random number key streams.

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The QKD platform further consists of two layers, a quantum layer and a key management layer. In the quantum layer, each point-to-point QKD link generates symmetric random number key pairs. QKD link consists of transmitter and receiver devices and two channels connecting them; one is a dedicated fiber for transmitting quantum signals and the other is a public authenticated channel for key distillation processing.

Generated keys are pushed up to servers, called key management agents (KMAs), in the key management layer, then stored and managed. Each KMA must be located in a physically protected place, referred to as “trusted key relay node”. The KMAs are connected by authenticated channels and execute key relays by key encapsulation in a hop-by-hop fashion. Thus the key pair can be shared between two terminal nodes even if they are not directly connected by a QKD link. The KMA resizes the key strings into appropriate key files, saves them with key IDs and QKD transmitter/receiver IDs and authenticates the relayed key file and other KMAs in the relay route.

In the key management layer, a key management server (KMS) is also located at one of the trusted key relay nodes and gathers link information, including bit error rates, key rates, amounts of accumulated keys, from the KMAs and organizes a routing table and provisions secure paths to the KMAs. To make the interface with the application layer, a key supply agent (KSA) is introduced on top of each KMA and supplies a user (the data owner/the storage server) the keys in an appropriate format depending on applications, according to the request from the user. The KSA records key IDs, users’ and applications’ IDs and date of key usage, which are also sent to the KMS to guarantee the traceability of the key. When stored keys are expired, they are erased. Thus a key life cycles is properly managed and the whole of the QKD platform is centrally controlled by the KMS.

The data owner and the storage servers can then use information theoretically secure keys in each phase. Once supplied with the keys, the responsibility of key management belongs to application users themselves. Thus the boundary of responsibility is set between the QKD platform and the application layer. Of course, access rights to the QKD platform and storage servers are completely separated.

Results

To test practicality of our system, we measure throughputs of the system on the QKD platform in the field environment. We have operated the QKD platform, constructed in a field testbed covering the Tokyo metropolitan area (≤90 km), named as the Tokyo QKD network. The Tokyo QKD Network itself consists of five nodes connected by six QKD links. As inscribed in Fig. 2, NEC Corporation provides two QKD links18. In these links, BB8419 protocol with decoy states20,21 are used. The QKD link “NEC-1” is made by a 22 km long field installed fiber looped back with the total attenuation rate of 13dB. About 95% of this fiber is aerial over poles. The Toshiba QKD link is based on decoy state BB84 protocol and connects the NICT headquarter and Otemachi (very center of Tokyo) through a dark fiber of the so-called JGN-X testbed22. Its length is 45 km and the transmission loss is about 14.5dB. The Gakushuin QKD link uses the Continuous Variable (CV)-QKD23. It is deployed in a link of about 2 km in the NICT premise. Another CV-QKD link provided by SeQureNet SARL is also deployed in the NICT premises24. The NTT QKD link is based on Differential Phase Shift (DPS)-QKD, in a loop-back configuration between the NICT headquarter and Otemachi whose length is 90km with an attenuation rate of 28.6dB25. Superconducting Single Photon Detectors (SSPDs)26 are used in this link due to their low dark counts. The quantum efficiencies of SSPDs are 10% at 100 c/s of dark count rate. Specifications are listed in Table 1.

Table 1 Specification of QKD links.
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The information theoretically secure distributed storage system with (3, 4) threshold for secret data is physically constructed with four nodes which are denoted as Node 1 to 4 of the QKD platform in Fig. 2 and the data owner is located in the same node as “storage server 1” just for experimental convenience. Here we should assume that in this node, “storage server 1” may be corrupted by attackers but the data owner can be protected against attackers. All the communications between the data owner machine and the storage servers and among the storage servers are carried out based on the QKD-enhanced Internet protocol (IP)27, in which all IP packets are OTP-encrypted and further authenticated with MAC based on Wegman-Carter protocol by using the keys from the QKD platform. The maximum payload size of IP frame format is 1500 bytes.

We prepare three kinds of secret data D whose size is 6955, 13695 and 46000 bytes. We prepare Mersenne primes q = 2m − 1 with indices m = 521, 1279, 2203, 3217, 4253, 10041, 11213, 19937, 23209, 44497 and 86243. The experimental results are shown in Fig. 3. These results show that our system achieves practical processing times. As shown in Fig. 3, performance of our system depends on the size of q. This is because (1) the computational time of the shares increases roughly in the square of bit length of q and (2) using a smaller prime q increases the number of blocks l and hence a longer processing time is required for dividing/managing the blocks and sending IP packets. There would be a good balance point, conditioned on the maximum payload size of 1500 bytes. In our experiments, the best performance can be found in the range of q with 11213 ≤ m ≤ 23209. The processing time of OTP-encryption of IP packets and calculation of MAC is negligible compared with calculation time of the other processes. The time of total process would be improved by implementing a plurality of payloads into a single frame with considering of the maximum payload size of 1500 bytes. ITS in our distributed storage is more or less realized at the expense of the amount of keys from the QKD platform. Actually, the total length of keys required to store and retrieve is about 30 times as long as the original secret data. Anyway, we show that the QKD platform works as the stable secure key supply infrastructure for requests from multi-users.

Figure 3
figure 3

Processing time as a function of index of Mersenne prime for each phase.

Reg Registration phase (black). Pre: Pre-computation and communications phase (red). Rec: Data reconstruction phase (blue). Dependence of numbers of divided blocks on Mersenne prime size is shown by green dashed line. The sizes of secret data are, (a) 6955 bytes, (b) 13695 bytes and (c) 46000 bytes respectively.

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Discussion

Our newly proposed unbreakable distributed storage system will also be useful to realize secure data relay via classical nodes. And, depending on a QKD network topology, we can relax requirements to the current trusted key relay node in the QKD network, not resorting to a greatly costly quantum repeater paradigm. In the newly proposed data relay scheme, the storage servers are in the distributed relay nodes between the sender (Alice) and the receiver (Bob). Alice sends shares of her data to the distributed relay nodes and Bob reconstructs the data via these relay nodes based on our distributed storage scheme. If relay nodes more than the threshold were never corrupted and the other relay nodes could be trusted, then the distributed key relay with ITS could be realized in the sense of the (k, n)-threshold SS. Moreover, data can be securely stored in the distributed relay nodes and can be downloaded when needed. If Alice and Bob can establish independent QKD links to each distributed relay node (embedded in the key relay node), this new data relay scheme could greatly relax the assumptions on the key relay nodes in the QKD network and hence could be a practical option in QKD networks which consist of a relatively large number of key relay nodes.

Conclusion

Thus by combining QKD and newly developed password-authenticated secret sharing scheme, we demonstrated, for the first time to our best knowledge, a distributed storage system with information theoretically secure data transmission, storage and authentication in a metropolitan area network. This system can also implement secure data relay function. In this newly developed protocol, the throughputs enhancement would be necessary. However, such a development issues are made explicit by operation in the real QKD network for the first time. Our scheme and system would contribute greatly to dealing with highly confidential data, such as state secrets and personal genomic data, in a network over long periods of time, furnishing the site diversity as well.

Additional Information

How to cite this article: Fujiwara, M. et al. Unbreakable distributed storage with quantum key distribution network and password-authenticated secret sharing. Sci. Rep. 6, 28988; doi: 10.1038/srep28988 (2016).