P2P social networks with broadcast encryption protected privacy

Abstract

Users of centralized online social networks (OSN) do not have full control over their data. The OSN provider can collect and mine user data and intentionally or accidentally leak it to third parties. Peer-to-peer (P2P) social networks address this problem by getting rid of the central provider and giving control to the users. However, existing proposals of P2P social networks have many drawbacks: reliance on trust, expensive anonymization or encryption techniques, etc. We propose to use broadcast encryption for data protection because of its efficiency and ability to not disclose information about who can decrypt what. We present an architecture of a P2P social network that uses a composition of public-key cryptography, broadcast encryption, and symmetric cryptography. The architecture provides confidentiality and limited integrity protection. It defines privacy-preserving profiles that allow users to quickly find data encrypted for them while preventing attackers from learning who can access which data. © 2012 IFIP International Federation for Information Processing.