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International Symposium on Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium

PETS 2009: Privacy Enhancing Technologies pp 216–234Cite as

On the Optimal Placement of Mix Zones

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 5672))

Abstract

In mobile wireless networks, third parties can track the location of mobile nodes by monitoring the pseudonyms used for identification. A frequently proposed solution to protect the location privacy of mobile nodes suggests changing pseudonyms in regions called mix zones. In this paper, we propose a novel metric based on the mobility profiles of mobile nodes in order to evaluate the mixing effectiveness of possible mix zone locations. Then, as the location privacy achieved with mix zones depends on their placement in the network, we analyze the optimal placement of mix zones with combinatorial optimization techniques. The proposed algorithm maximizes the achieved location privacy in the system and takes into account the cost induced by mix zones to mobile nodes. By means of simulations, we show that the placement recommended by our algorithm significantly reduces the tracking success of the adversary.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. LCA1, EPFL, Switzerland

    Julien Freudiger, Reza Shokri & Jean-Pierre Hubaux

Authors
  1. Julien Freudiger
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  2. Reza Shokri
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  3. Jean-Pierre Hubaux
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science, University of Waterloo, University Avenue West, N2L 3G1, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    Ian Goldberg

  2. Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, 305 North University Street, IN 47907-2107, West Lafayete, USA

    Mikhail J. Atallah

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Freudiger, J., Shokri, R., Hubaux, JP. (2009). On the Optimal Placement of Mix Zones. In: Goldberg, I., Atallah, M.J. (eds) Privacy Enhancing Technologies. PETS 2009. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5672. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-03168-7_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-03168-7_13

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-03167-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-03168-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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