SA2FE: A Secure, Anonymous, Auditable, and Fair Edge Computing Service Offloading Framework

Abstract: The inclusion of pervasive computing devices in a democratized edge computing ecosystem can significantly expand the capability and coverage of near-end computing for large-scale applications. However, offloading user tasks to heterogeneous and decentralized edge devices comes with the dual risk of both endangered user data security and privacy due to the curious base station or malicious edge servers, and unfair offloading and malicious attacks targeting edge servers from other edge servers and/or users. Existing solutions to edge access control and offloading either rely on "always-on" cloud servers with reduced edge benefits or fail to protect sensitive user service information. To address these challenges, this paper presents SA2FE, a novel framework for edge access control, offloading and accounting. We design a rerandomizable puzzle primitive and a corresponding scheme to protect sensitive service information from eavesdroppers and ensure fair offloading decisions, while a blind token-based scheme safeguards user privacy, prevents double spending, and ensures usage accountability. The security of SA2FE is proved under the Universal Composability framework, and its performance and scalability are demonstrated with implementation on commodity mobile devices and edge servers.