By Luanganggang, Cyber Security and Privacy Officer (CSPO), Huawei Tanzania
The 5G security architecture is based on previous 3G and 4G security architecture but expands and enhances them into a new environment. It also includes new enhancements such as encryption, authentication, user privacy, and a set of security measures and procedures to implement the security controls.
5G Security Explained
5G security is the combined physical and cyber protection for the underlying 5G network infrastructure including hardware and software, the traffic traversing it and users of the network. Proper administration and execution of 5G security should produce the following five core properties, which contribute to the trustworthiness of the 5G system:
• Resilience
• Communication security
• Identity management
• Privacy
• Security assurance
Security Hardening of 5G Standards
The 5G SA network supports more security features to tackle potential security challenges in the future 5G lifecycle. 5G NSA and 4G networks share the same security mechanisms and work in standard and practice consistently to keep improving their security levels.
o Enhanced SBA security: The new SBA architecture of the 5G core network provides network functions as services.
The relevant standard defines service security mechanisms for the architecture, including finger-grained authorization between network functions (NFs) and stronger protection for user-plane data transmission between operators, which ensures the security of data transmission on the signaling and user planes of the core network.
o User-plane integrity protection for 5G NSA and 4G networks: The user-plane integrity protection mechanism of 5G SA networks is introduced to 5G NSA and 4G networks to enhance air interface security.
As standards evolve, 5G cyber security features continue to be expanded and enhanced to tackle potential security challenges and enhance security throughout the 5G lifecycle.
New Technologies
In terms of new technologies, cloudification and virtualization technologies are widely used on 5G core networks, which creates security risks in the sharing and virtualization of infrastructure resources. In the future, the impact of quantum computing on traditional cryptographic algorithms shall also be considered to ensure network security.
The industry is working together to address new security risks faced by 5G architectures, technologies, and services, and address potential security challenges through unified 5G security standards, common 5G security concepts, and an agreed 5G security framework.
In 2020, 111 companies (including their subsidiaries) from around the world sent technical experts to six SA3 meetings to develop the latest 5G security standards.
The 3GPP SA3 Working Group has established 42 projects to analyze security threats and risks in various 5G scenarios. Conclusions are gradually being drawn from these projects and implemented in security standards.
The GSMA and 3GPP jointly define NESAS to assess the security of mobile network equipment development and verification.
The GSMA 5G Cybersecurity Knowledge Base proposes the security concept of shared responsibility and baseline security controls based on typical 5G network threats and key security solutions.
The top-down design principles of the 5G security architecture ensure a systematic, dynamic, and adaptive security framework.
With these measures, we believe that 5G cyber security is manageable and verifiable.
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