Securing national e-ID infrastructures: Tor networks as a source of threats

Abstract

Securing national electronic identification (e-ID) systems requires an in depth understanding of the associated threats. The trade of identity related artefacts in the darknet facilitates illegal activities such as identity theft in both physical and virtual worlds. This paper reports the findings of an exploratory analysis of identity trading in the darknet. We capture the key features of three major markets of fake IDs in Tor networks, and apply attack-defense trees to show how the security of an e-ID infrastructure is affected by this phenomenon.