Unlinkable priced oblivious transfer with rechargeable wallets

Abstract

We present the first truly unlinkable priced oblivious transfer protocol. Our protocol allows customers to buy database records while remaining fully anonymous, i.e., (1) the database does not learn who purchases a record, and cannot link purchases by the same customer; (2) the database does not learn which record is being purchased, nor the price of the record that is being purchased; (3) the customer can only obtain a single record per purchase, and cannot spend more than his account balance; (4) the database does not learn the customer's remaining balance. In our protocol customers keep track of their own balances, rather than leaving this to the database as done in previous protocols. Our priced oblivious transfer protocol is also the first to allow customers to (anonymously) recharge their balances. Finally, we prove our protocol secure in the standard model (i.e., without random oracles). © 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.