Epistemic Verification of Anonymity

  • Authors:
  • Jan van Eijck;Simona Orzan

  • Affiliations:
  • CWI, Kruislaan 413, P.O. Box 94079, 1090 GB Amsterdam and UiL OTS, Utrecht University, Trans 10, 3512 JK Utrecht;Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Eindhoven University of Technology, P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven

  • Venue:
  • Electronic Notes in Theoretical Computer Science (ENTCS)
  • Year:
  • 2007

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Abstract

Anonymity is not a trace-based property, therefore traditional model checkers are not directly able to express it and verify it. However, by using epistemic logic (logic of knowledge) to model the protocols, anonymity becomes an easily verifiable epistemic formula. We propose using Dynamic Epistemic Logic to model security protocols and properties, in particular anonymity properties. We have built tool support for DEL verification which reuses state-of-the-art tool support for automata-based verification. We illustrate this approach by analyzing an anonymous broadcast protocol and an electronic voting protocol. By comparison with a process-based analysis of the same protocols, we also discuss the relative (dis)advantages of the process-based and epistemic-based verification methods in general.