Scalable RFID authentication protocol based on physically unclonable functions

Abstract

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology is commonly used for tracking and identifying objects. However, this technology poses serious security and privacy concerns for individuals carrying the tags. To address these issues, various security protocols have been proposed. Unfortunately, many of these solutions suffer from scalability problems, requiring the back-end server to work linearly in the number of tags for a single tag identification. Some protocols offer O(1) or O(log n) identification complexity but are still susceptible to serious attacks. Few protocols consider attacks on the reader-side. Our proposed RFID authentication protocol eliminates the need for a search in the back-end and leverages Physically Unclonable Functions (PUFs) to securely store tag secrets, making it resistant to tag corruption attacks. It provides constant-time identification without sacrificing privacy and offers log2 n times better identification performance than the state-of-the-art protocol. It ensures destructive privacy for tag holders in the event of reader corruption without any conditions. Furthermore, it enables offline readers to maintain destructive privacy in case of corruption.