Security Framework to Protect NFC Mobile Wallet for Railway Ticketing

Abstract

Purpose of this research is to provide security framework to protect Near Field Communication (NFC) enabled mobile wallet for railway ticketing. Currently in Sri Lanka there are no known implementations of secure NFC mobile wallet for railway ticketing. This provides more value to both passengers and railway department by ensuring easy and convenient contactless ticketing and reduced number of passengers who are not having legal railway tickets. Main objectives of this research are to provide secure way to store mobile money in the mobile wallet, controlled access to mobile wallet and secure communication channel with in NFC ecosystem. Methodology used to design secure framework for NFC mobile wallet is simplicity and best practices which are proven for years. Implementation part of the secure framework was carried out using NFC enabled Android phone as a NFC reader and NFC tag as a mobile wallet. Secure framework designed for NFC mobile wallet for railway ticketing can be used as common secure NFC mobile wallet which facilitates any kind of good or service purchasing. Evaluation of the framework was carried out using common threat scenarios such as lost of mobile wallet, data modification/eavesdropping and cloning of mobile wallet. From the evaluation results it proved that the secure framework is strong enough to deal with common threats that are inherent for token based e-ticketing solutions.