Volume 2 - Issue 4
Doubly-Anonymous Crowds: Using Secret-Sharing to achieve Sender- and Receiver-Anonymity
- Stefan Rassy
Alpen-Adria-Universitat Klagenfurt Klagenfurt, Carinthia, Austria
stefan.rass@aau.at
- Raphael Wigoutschnigg
Alpen-Adria-Universitat Klagenfurt Klagenfurt, Carinthia, Austria
raphael.wigoutschnigg@aau.at
- Peter Schartner
Alpen-Adria-Universitat Klagenfurt Klagenfurt, Carinthia, Austria
peter.schartner@aau.at
Keywords: Anonymity, anonymous communication, crowds, mix-net, secret-sharing.
Abstract
Anonymous communication is usually achieved by using overlay networks and public-key cryptography.
Besides well-established protocols, based on onion routing, various competing solutions have
been proposed in the literature. In this work we extend the Crowds system by providing sender and
adjustable receiver anonymity. Our solution is robust against a coalition of passive adversaries having
intermediate nodes in the network conquered in an attempt to discover the sender and receiver
of an observed communication. Absolute privacy for the receiver is achievable asymptotically in the
size of the network, which is beyond the control of a sender. We demonstrate that a certain level of
anonymity is achievable in finitely large networks and under full control of the sender.