Short Message Service (sms) security solution for mobile devices

 
C. 
SCOPE OF RESEARCH 
This thesis focuses on the use of encryption to secure SMS messages. 
The encryption requirements of voice traffic and other data traffic will not be 
discussed. The characteristics of different encryption schemes and their 
performance on a modern mobile device are presented. The properties of SMS 
were assessed with respect to their impact on encryption selection. Based on 
the measurement results, a suitable encryption scheme for SMS is selected, and 
deployed. A typical application is used to validate the selection.

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D. RESEARCH 
OBJECTIVES 
1. 
Primary Research Question 
The primary research objective is to compare the performances of 
different encryption schemes on a modern mobile device and determine a 
suitable scheme, or combination of schemes, for protecting SMS messages. The 
aim is to determine if there are better ways of protecting SMS messages than 
just using symmetric encryption, thereby alleviating the constraints imposed on 
encryption use by the difficulties of symmetric key management. 
2. Subsidiary 
Research 
Questions 
Based on actual measurements, it will be possible to determine the 
overhead, such as power consumption, timing, and transmission, associated with 
encryption operations for different schemes. With this information, it may be 
possible to devise combinations of encryption schemes to meet different security 
requirements for different applications. 
E. RESEARCH 
METHODOLOGY 
The research comprises of two major areas, namely the comparison of 
different encryption schemes and the identification and deployment of a selected 
scheme.
The available encryption schemes will be studied and compared based on 
their security properties and characteristics through literature research. The 
properties of SMS will be studied in detail to understand its characteristics and to 
determine security requirements. The comparison of the performance of different 
encryption schemes will be done using results from actual measurements. An 
experiment will be set up to measure the power consumption, timing overhead 
and transmission overheads associated with encryption. Conclusions can then 
be drawn taking into consideration these factors. 

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The demonstration application selected to validate the choice of 
encryption is a “Secure Chat” application based on SMS. The application was 
chosen because it has practical applications and is demanding in terms of real 
time user interactivity.