Specifying Access Policies for Secure Content Dissemination of XML: A Technique Inspired by DNA Cryptography

Abstract

SOA helps to provide business agility by configuring entities to maximize loose coupling and reuse. XML is the most relevant means to provide interoperatablity among various entities. When in network, a XML file can be prone to hacking and unauthorized access, thus data integrity and confidentiality are the important issues of communication. Secure dissemination of an XML file is one of the techniques to ensure data integrity and confidentiality. This paper presents a secure dissemination technique such that extraneous data not meant for a legitimate consumer is inaccessible, there will be no information leak. The technique applies DNA cryptography due to its feature of compactness and simplicity. The technique encrypts the data and hides it in a garbage file; such that only legitimate consumer can see only the subscribed amount of data according to the access policies using the restriction enzymes. The paper also presents multicast dissemination interface that implements the proposed technique at the server level. The interface is built dynamically and asynchronously using a publish–subscribe methodology. The results indicate that the proposed technique not only satisfies the requirement specification of secure dissemination, but also points out its robustness in terms of time required to break the key. The technique is computationally secure as the time to crack the key is quite long and increases with increase in key length.