Improved hidden vector encryption with short ciphertexts and tokens

Abstract

Hidden vector encryption (HVE) is a particular kind of predicate encryption that is an important cryptographic primitive having many applications, and it provides conjunctive equality, subset, and comparison queries on encrypted data. In predicate encryption, a ciphertext is associated with attributes and a token corresponds to a predicate. The token that corresponds to a predicate f can decrypt the ciphertext associated with attributes x if and only if f(x) = 1. Currently, several HVE schemes were proposed where the ciphertext size, the token size, and the decryption cost are proportional to the number of attributes in the ciphertext. In this paper, we construct efficient HVE schemes where the token consists of just four group elements and the decryption only requires four bilinear map computations, independent of the number of attributes in the ciphertext. We first construct an HVE scheme in composite order bilinear groups and prove its selective security under the well-known assumptions. Next, we convert it to use prime order asymmetric bilinear groups where there are no efficiently computable isomorphisms between two groups.