Alternative Security Architectures for e-Science∗

There have been recent proposals in search of alternative security architectures to PKIs for grid application and e-Science. The application of identity-based cryptography (IBC) in designing a grid security architecture seems to be interesting because of its attractive properties, such as, being certificate-free and having small key sizes. In this paper, we discuss our latest research findings of the identity-based approach in designing a grid security architecture. These include a performance analysis of the identity-based approach, and the application of identity-based secret public keys in designing a password-based version of the standard TLS protocol used in MyProxy.