Journal of Ambient Intelligence and Humanized Computing

https://doi.org/10.1007/s12652-020-01911-5

ORIGINAL RESEARCH

E health care data privacy preserving efficient file retrieval

from the cloud service provider using attribute based file encryption
N. Deepa1 · P. Pandiaraja1

Received: 14 January 2020 / Accepted: 20 March 2020

© Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020

Abstract
File storing and retrieving is performed in the robust as well as secure manner by using the cloud computing technology.
Various researchers have developed numerous mechanisms via attribute based encryption for the health care applications.
Although, more protocols developed among them only very few techniques were efficient and robust for the quick retrieval
of reports from the cloud but many protocols suffer by reason of less security, confidentiality and integrity. Existing tech-
niques was based on encrypting the file based on the keyword. But in our proposed protocol, we have developed an attribute
based encryption which will overcome the issues faced by the previous research techniques. The group of patient records are
encrypted with single common attribute. From the survey, it is clear that the existing protocols suffer due to high computa-
tion and communication complexity. So as to rectify the existing issue, we proposed the effective recovery of files by using
attribute based file encryption mechanism from cloud (ERFC). When comparing to the existing protocols, our proposed
ERFC mechanism takes minimum computation and communication complexity for four working mechanisms namely, patient
key computation, doctor index building computation, cloud working mechanism and finally patient report decryption. All
these four working mechanisms are developed for effective recovery of files to the end users. Our proposed protocol is secure
against some attacks like Eavesdropping, masquerade, replay and man in the middle attack. Our performance analysis sec-
tion describes that our ERFC mechanism is better with communication as well as computation complexity when related to
the other existing protocols.

Keywords  Computation complexity · Communication complexity · Attributes · Privacy · Cloud computing · Attacks · Key
computation · Index building

1 Introduction Yuen et al. (2014) have proposed post task supplementary

Jiang et al. (2014) have proposed probability based reply
system which is developed to illustrate that the patient’s
reports are accessible and placed in a particular cloud ser-
vice provider. With the intention of resisting the cloud ser-
vice provider collusion, public cloud is arranged with certain
restrictions like balanced financial security method, limited
collusion security method and replies time assurance, are
developed.
* N. Deepa
deepaanatesan@gmail.com
P. Pandiaraja
sppandiaraja@gmail.com
1
Department of Computer Science and Engineering,
M.Kumarasamy College of Engineering, Karur,
Tamil Nadu 639113, India
input method in which the leakages messages need to be
well-defined before the challenger guesses the public key.
The secret key leakage is the famous on going issue in the
cloud. The existing methods are suffering due to the secret
key leakage. This method is capable to avoid the worldwide
attacks. This method also solves the leakage issue faced by
the doctor as well as the certificate authority during the key
distribution.
Radogna et al. (2019) proposed the respired inhalation
monitoring home ventilation treatment for patients with scat-
tered medicine scheme. The patient and the doctor can auto-
matically authenticate with the protocol. The cloud is aware
of the patient request. But the cloud service provider is una-
ware of the patient identity. So the cloud service provider
will fix K number of times for the certain set of patients. If
the patient request exceed the M times, then the access will
get stopped.

13
Vol.:(0123456789)

Sahai (2005) have proposed the identity encryption based
protocol using fuzzy logic. The messages are encrypted by
using the identity based encryption, meanwhile the attrib-
utes of the messages comprise of the patients identity. This
method has the advantages like (1) error accepting and (2)
robust against the attacks which are based on the collusion.
This method is based on the identity to ensure the security.
Zhu et al. (2014) have proposed the ring based learning
with error method using the cryptographic technique. This
method is more secure with cryptographic encryptions. This
method has the advantage of minimizing the hardness of
the short vector issue. And it is suitable for the world wide
applications. The existing attribute based encryption suffers
from the quantum cryptanalysis and inefficiency for the real
world applications.
Deepa (2017) et al. illustrated a detailed review with
probable attacks on the data privacy preservation, for the
top N reports retrieval for various patients. This detailed
review method overcomes the security issues faced by the
existing methods.
Zemmoudj et al. (2019) developed context aware protocol
for pseudonymization as well as authorization prototypical
on behalf of IoT established smart clinics. The encrypted
reports are placed in the access index tree. The patient can
obtain the results if the patient attribute is matched with
the doctor attribute. Chosen plaintext attack is not possible
with the help of the Diffie Hellman assumption. By using
the Canetti Halevi Katz procedure the chosen cipher text
attack can be resolved by the unique signature. The advan-
tage of this method is (1) less cipher text size and less time
for encrypting as well as for decrypting the files and (2)
secure against the chosen cipher text attack.
Xie et al. (2013) have proposed the file outsource towards
cloud service provider by using the attribute based encryp-
tion. In protocol an effective and secure attribute encryp-
tion based protocol is developed. In the access index tree
structure there may be inside attackers or outside attackers.
In order to resist attackers this method has developed the
patient revocation technique. This method has the advantage
of attacker revocation. However this protocol suffers from
huge computation time.
Balu and Kuppusamy (2014) has proposed Cipher text
Policy attribute encryption based protocol. This protocol is
based on encrypting the patients files based on the access
policy and attributes. It is used to share the numbers via
secret sharing technique. The encrypted files are decrypted
if access tree attributes are matched. But it has more storage
overhead.
Chen et al. (2014) have proposed attribute encryption
based protocol. The proposed protocol supports the cloud
patient removal, in addition to outsourcing the decryption
technique towards the cloud. This method is secure against
the chosen cipher text attack. This method has developed the
13
N. Deepa, P. Pandiaraja
security intermediate entity that supports the user removal
once if they are identified as attacker. The communication
overhead is the drawback of this method.
Liu et  al. (2014) have proposed signing as well as
encrypting the attributes method. This method is used for
storing the patients encrypted files over the cloud service
provide for providing the data security. The drawback of
this method is having the admins for providing the security.
If the admins are the attackers then the patient’s data can
be misused. In order to overcome the above said issue the
author have proposed the new technique of signing as well
as encrypting the patients files to provide full confidential-
ity, security and privacy for the patients data. This method
suffers from computation overhead.
Fan et al. (2014) have proposed automatically changing
membership for the patients. The existing methods suffer
due to huge computation cost for managing the chang-
ing keys as well as attributes for all the live as well as left
patients. Whenever the patient join the hospital or leave the
hospital the key as well as the attribute should be updated.
If we manage the dynamic keys for dynamic patients for the
real time applications then the communication and storage
complexity will be huge. In order to resolve the above said
issue the author have developed the dynamic key managing
technique for dynamically changing patients. The advantage
of the proposed protocol is low computation time.
Xhafa et  al. (2014) have developed effective search-
ing and acceptable grained access structure for storing the
patient’s health reports in a cloud platform. Implementing
the access structure for searching the cipher text reports
is the on-going issue. To resolve the above said issue the
author have proposed the new acceptable grained access
structure for having the robust search over the cloud. They
have also developed the fuzzy logic based search over the
access structure for have the scalable and reliable results.
Gentry and Silverberg (2002) have proposed ranked iden-
tity based encryption method and signing method which are
having entire collusion conflict on a random integer stages.
This method has the advantage of the resistance against cho-
sen cipher text attack. But the drawback is more communica-
tion complexity.
Pandiaraja and Deepa (2019) have proposed the new data
privacy preserving mechanism for many data users with the
help of genetic algorithm. This method overcomes the com-
munication and computation complexity issue, which are
faced by the existing methods.
Indra (2020) developed breast cancer classification
based Tetrolet transform and analysis scheme designed for
E healthcare. The advantage of this method is quick search-
ing and delivering the results to the patients in the robust
manner. But the drawback of this method is high computa-
tion complexity due to the construction of the layered access
structure.
E health care data privacy preserving efficient file retrieval from the cloud service provider…
Deng et  al. (2014) have proposed cipher text policy
categorized attribute based encryption. When the patients
reports are encrypted with the attributes then this method
will have the challenging issue like key distribution. The
key distribution is the major issue if the patients are catego-
rized under several health care issues, locality, and kinds of
disease. The advantage of the proposed work is having the
attributes prearranged in a matrix format and the patients
consuming more attributes provide their privileged access
towards patients at a lesser stage. Thus the patient’s data are
securely shared in the hierarchical order of the hospitals.
1.1 Main objectives
In this ERFC proposed work, we have developed effective
recovery of files by using attribute based file encryption
mechanism from cloud service provider.
The foremost objectives in the proposed work are fourfold
as follows:
• To develop a Patient key generation method to improve
the security.
• To build a secure index method with low computation
complexity.
• To construct a new semi trusted cloud matching method
with low computation time.
• To construct decryption method for decrypting the files
with low communication complexity.
1.2 Paper organized
The ERFC proposed work has been ordered in the subse-
quent way. The related works description is mentioned in
Sect. 2. ERFC architecture displayed in the proposed work
are well-defined in Sect. 3. ERFC notations and the pro-
posed ERFC working mechanism are given in the Sect. 4. In
Sect. 5, the ERFC mechanism is analysed and compared to
security analysis. Performance result analysis of the ERFC
mechanism is described in Sect. 6. The conclusions and
future works are represented in the Sect. 7.
2 Related works
Nishide et al. (2008) have proposed secret access index
tree for placing the information about the data users. The
doctor can encrypt the patient reports via secret access
structure. The users will submit the keyword for search-
ing the document to the certificate authority, the patient
receives the key for decryption by the certificate authority,
if the user is legitimate. Even for the legitimate patients,
guessing the secret access structure is the challenging
task. If the patient attribute does not match towards the
attributes of the secret access structure then the patient
cannot decrypt the reports. The advantage of this scheme
is data integrity. The drawback of this scheme is storage
complexity.
Ibraimi et al. (2009) have developed effective cipher text
policy encryption protocol. The proposed protocol supports
the patient’s secret key with the attribute set. The patient’s
reports encryption is done under the access structure. The
patients can decrypt the encrypted reports based on the
attributes as well as the access structure. The author has
used the operations like AND, OR for denoting the calcula-
tion performed in the access structure. The advantage of this
method is security. But it suffers due to the communication
overhead.
Hur (2013) has proposed information sharing method.
The information storage and distribution suffers from many
issues like information modification, hacking and removing
the information. The drawback faced by the existing proto-
cols are escrowing key, inside attackers. In order to resolve
the above said issue the author have developed the policy
based attribute encryption. By implementing the group key
distribution procedure, the inside attacker removal process
is made simple.
Chu et al. (2013) have proposed information sharing tech-
nique to avoid the personal information leakage. The storage
areas of cloud like Google Drive, Dropbox and SkyDrive
has the possibility of leaking of information. To avoid the
information leakage the authors have developed the infor-
mation sharing method. This method has more computation
overhead.
Liang et al. (2014) have proposed automatically cloud
updating and re-encryption technique via identity based
encryption. The existing protocol suffers due to high cost
for the authentication, key updating process. To resolve the
above said issue, the authors have proposed the automatic
cloud updation. After the message communication time, the
cloud will re-encrypt the key. So by default the removed
user cannot use the same key for attacking the patient’s data.
Deepa and Pandiaraja (2019) have proposed the hybrid
context aware recommendation system using the merkle hash
tree for e-health care from cloud by evolutionary algorithm.
This method is proposing the data privacy of the patient’s
health reports access from the cloud. This method supports
security, communication and computation complexity.
Anvita Gupta et al. (2020) developed image encryption by
means of categorization genetic algorithm using 4D based
chaotic maps. Only the authenticated patients can decrypt
the data based on the known access tree length. The certifi-
cate authority will perform the re-encryption for giving the
access privileges to the next level hospital authorities. The
advantage of this method is data privacy. Since they have
used the access tree length and performing the re-encryption
the communication overhead is huge.
13

Liu et al. (2016) have proposed double authentication
access index structure. The access index structure is built by
using set of entire attributes. For implementing the encryp-
tion, the attributes as well as lightweight safety device are
essential. If two persons with the same set of attributes
require the authentication means, the cloud service provider
will check the legitimacy and restrict the patient login. This
rule is used to secure the patient information. The advantage
of this method is authentication, but the cloud is control-
ling the patients data, thus if the cloud is untrusted then the
patients data may be misused.
Guo et al. (2014) have proposed identifiers based on radio
frequency. The existing methods suffer from the major issue
like storage complexity and the lengthy keys for decryption.
In order to overcome the storage complexity and the lengthy
keys for decryption, the authors have proposed the cipher
text policy based encryption with the standard size keys. The
key standard size is represented as 672. Since the key size
is standard this method is used for the light weight gadgets
for storing the keys which are used for the decryption. The
advantage of this method is data storage. But the drawback
of this method is communication overhead.
Liu et al. (2016) developed hierarchical attribute based
encryption using various hierarchy stages. The doctor will
encrypt the reports under patient’s related attributes, where
the confidential key patients are linked in index tree. In sur-
vey, the access structure built with the similar stages. But in
this method the access structure is built in hierarchical way.
The advantage of this method is data storage, but the user
removal will be the challenging task in this method.
Yang et al. (2015) have proposed effective cloud records
distribution and hacker removal technique. Attribute encryp-
tion method is used for implementing the records distribu-
tion over the cloud. The hacker removal is the difficult task,
if the access structure is built based on the attributes. If huge
amount of patients are using the access structure means, then
the hacker removal is definitely a challenging task. The data
privacy is the advantage of this method. The drawback of
this proposed protocol is computation time.
Liang et al. (2015) have developed re-encrypting patient
reports based cryptographic technique. This method permits
the doctor to proxy the access privileges of the encrypted
reports. By using this method the information leakage can
be avoided. Based on the policy of the access structure,
the encrypted report can be modified to another encrypted
report. This can be applied for all the worldwide health care
applications. The main advantage of this method is encrypt-
ing the patient report twice. Thus the data security is main-
tained. But the storage overhead is the disadvantage of this
method.
Zheng et al. (2015) have proposed privacy preserving
method for the user reports. This method uses the prob-
ability enlargement technique for evaluating the user
13
N. Deepa, P. Pandiaraja
reports. Since the key size for implementing this method
is less, the efficiency of this method is high. Since this
method takes all the entities properties into the account,
the computation complexity is huge.
Wang et al. (2015) have proposed hierarchical reports
sharing technique. By using this method, numerous reports
can be distributed to more number of patients by using sin-
gle encryption technique. The hierarchical of the reports
are maintained via attribute encryption scheme. The
advantage of this method is minimizing the access tree
and reducing the number of operations performed by the
existing methods. This method needs only single decryp-
tion key for decrypting the patient reports. The storage
overhead is the drawback of this method.
Zou et al. (2013) have proposed hierarchical attribute
encryption method. The correlation between the attributes
and its metadata are clearly defined. The benefit of this
method is easy key computation by the patients by using
the attribute collections present in the access tree. The
encrypted report is in the standard size. The disadvantage
of this method is lengthy secret key size.
Green et al. (2011) have proposed the cipher text attrib-
ute encryption technique. The existing methods have the
disadvantage like lengthy encrypted information and
lengthy computation time for decrypting the encrypted
information. In order to overcome the above said issue
the authors have developed the attribute encryption. The
advantage of this method is using only one key for con-
verting the attributes into the encrypted information.
Advantage of this method is less computation time for
the decryption, since the numbers of the operations are
minimized.
Secure patient report access and the patient file decryp-
tion are very important in the area of on-going research.
The patient reports encryption and the decryption are done
with the attributes for the secure and quick recovery of the
patient reports from the cloud service provider without any
attacks. Pournaghi et al. (2020) developed safe scheme for
sharing medical records using block chain technology based
on attribute-based encryption.
3 Proposed ERFC system architecture
Proposed ERFC structure is giving security to the cloud user
files by using encryption and cloud service provider match-
ing mechanisms.
The ERFC system structure comprises 4 elements that
is (1) Doctor, (2) patient, (3) certificate authority and (4)
cloud service provider, which is the semi reliable cloud as
signified in Fig. 1. ERFC mechanism overall operations is
demonstrated in the below Table 1.
E health care data privacy preserving efficient file retrieval from the cloud service provider…

Fig. 1  ERFC system structure

Doctors
Cloud Service Provider
5
7

6
3
4
Certificate Authority
8
2

9
Patients

Table 1  Process of ERFC structure

S. no Flow of the ERFC structure

1 Doctor place the encrypted reports over the semi trusted cloud, which are encrypted based on attributes
2 Patient registering to the certificate authority
3 After successful authentication, the confidential key of the patient is sent by the certificate authority
4 Patient request for the keyword towards the semi trusted cloud
5 Semi trusted cloud sends the patient identity to the certificate authority
6 Authentication of identity is completed through the certificate authority
7 When authentication is positive, then the semi trusted cloud examines the index to deliver the results in
the correct order to the Patient
8 Ranked results is transferred towards the Patient
9 Confidential key is mainly used to recover the encrypted files

4 Proposed ERFC working mechanism G0, G1 = dual cyclic group.

p = prime integer.
The Doctor will encrypt the reports with the attributes g = generator of cyclic group G0.
that are used in that particular file. In order to have high e = bilinear paring, e:G0 × G0 → G1.
security the attribute is moreover encrypted via confiden- Properties of bilinear mapping:
tial key of the doctor. The patient will place the searching
keyword to the semi trusted cloud. Then the semi trusted S. no. Properties Equations
cloud will send the ranked results to the patient. Confiden- 1 Bilinearity e(bv,cw) = e (c,d)vw
tial key of the patient is used to recover the encrypted files 2 Non-degeneracy e(g,g) not equal to1
which are placed in semi trusted cloud. 3 Distributivity e(bv,cw·dx) = e(bv,cw)·e(bv,dx)

4.1 Notations of ERFC 1. Patient key computation and doctor index building com-
putation
The notations of ERFC is given in Table 2.

13
 N. Deepa, P. Pandiaraja

Table 2  ERFC notations pk = G0 , g, p
(1)
S. no Symbolizations Explanations p = ge , ê (g, g)w
pk Doctor public key Attribute assigning for each offspring node is respon-
1 G0,G1 Cyclic group sible for the confidential number allocation in the cor-
2 p Prime integer responding offspring node. The confidential number is
3 g Generator chosen from the cyclic group allocated from the offspring node to the parental node.
4 w,e Doctor confidential key The confidential number is produced using the Eq. (2):
5 n Doctor index(z)
�
∑
6 S𝛽 Offspring node in tree S𝛽 = Sy Δi , S𝛽(index (𝛽))
(2)
7 Sy Parental node in index y𝜀S𝛽

8 index(𝛼) Child node Index of the tree

where i = index(𝛽  ), S𝛽′  = index(𝛽  ), index(𝛽  ) is the num-
9 { f1 , f2 , f3 … … .fn} No of files
10 {a1 , a2 , a3 … … an } Files attributes
ber of node 𝛽  . The index tree is assigned using the confi-
11 ̂n Complete cipher text files
dential number via iterating the Eq. (2). Encryption of the
CT
attribute setin the index tree is done with confidential num-
12 tn,t Certificate authority random number
ber of elements of the nodes. Every node in the tree is
13 S𝛽 Child node confidential number
storing the group of reports, the files of the patients are
14 Sy Files confidential number
described as {f1 , f2 , f3 … fn}. The attributes used for file
15 F𝛽 File placed in the offspring node
encryptionis denoted as {a1 , a2 , a3 … an } . Complete cipher
16 SKn Doctor confidential shared key
text files are denoted as:CT�n = attn ⋅ ẽ (g, g)S𝛽 .
17 CT𝛽 Child node Cipher text file
Index tree
18 CT ∗ Ciphertext of entire files
From the Fig. 2, when the patient submitted the search
19 ̃n Mutual confidential key
CT request [0, 0.2, 1, 0.3, 0] to the cloud. The index tree will
20 ê (g, g) Bilinear paring search in the right node of the left tree first, and the left
node will be searched. After completing left side, it will
continue to search in the right node of the tree and then
The over-all attributes placed in the tree are the resource
it will search in the left node of the index right tree. For
for generating the confidential key with the help of key gen-
computing ranked results we have chosen the cosine simi-
eration algorithm. The key computation segment produces
larity. The computed ranked outcomes are tabulated in the
the confidential key with the help entire attributesplaced tree
Table 3.
structure. The pk refers to public based key, G0 is cyclic
group, g is used forgenerating the elements in cyclic group,
2. Cloud working mechanisms
e denotesbilinear paring, e , w is the confidential key.

0.2 1 0.3 0 0.1

ROOT NODE

0 0.1 0 0.5 0.2 0 1 0 1 0.4

FILE 1 FILE 2

FILE 3 FILE 4 FILE 5 FILE 6

0 0.3 0.4 1 0 1 0.5 1 0 0.5 0 0.2 1 0.1 0.2 1 0 0.4 0.5 0.3

Fig. 2  Index tree

13
E health care data privacy preserving efficient file retrieval from the cloud service provider…

Table 3  Ranked outcomes from the index tree �n ⋅ F𝛽

CT
S. no File number Ranked results
= ( ) (10)
ẽ CTy∗ , F
1 File 5 0.95
2 File 6 0.82
3 File 4 0.65 �n ⋅ ẽ (g, g)t.e.S𝛽
CT
= (11)
4 File 3 0.54
( )
ẽ gS𝛽 , g ⋅ pt
5 File 2 0.42
6 File 1 0.29
� ⋅ ẽ (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽
CT
= ( Sn ) ( S ) (12)
ẽ g 𝛽 , g ⋅ ẽ g 𝛽 ⋅ pt
Once the Patient search request matched to the doctor’s
index tree, then the semi trusted cloud will do the matching �n ⋅ ẽ (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽
CT
process. When matching process is completed then the hier- = (13)
ẽ (g, g)S𝛽 ⋅ ẽ gS𝛽 ⋅ ge⋅t
( )
archical reports are sent to the patient. This is possible only
when the patients are legitimate. If the patients are legiti-
mate then the certificate authority will send the confidential �n ⋅ ẽ (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽
CT
key along with attributes to the patients. Once the encrypted attn = (14)
reports and the shared key of the Patient and the doctor gets ẽ (g, g)S𝛽 ⋅ ẽ (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽
matched then the encrypted reports are sent to the patients.
�n
CT
(15)
( )
ê SKn , CT𝛽 attn =
F𝛼 = ( ) (3) ẽ (g, g)S𝛽
ê SKn� , CT𝛽�
The patient decrypt the file through the mutualconfi-
dential key.
ê (gt , pattn ,tn ), pS𝛽
= ( ) (4) �n = attn ⋅ ẽ (g, g)S𝛽
CT (16)
ê ptn , pattn ,S𝛽

( ) ( )
ê gt , pS𝛽 ⋅ ê pattn ,tn , pS𝛽
= ( ) (5)
ê ptn , patti .S𝛽
5 Security analysis
1. Eaves dropping
ê gt , pS𝛽 ⋅ ê (p, p)attn ⋅tn ⋅S𝛽
( )
= (6)
ê (p, p)attn ⋅tn ⋅S𝛽 The certificate authoritysends the secret key to the
Patient in the secure channel. So for the hackers it is not
= ê gt , ge.S𝛽
( )
(7) possible to eavesdrop the confidential number which is
present in the every offspring node (Table 4).

2. Replay attack
F𝛼 = ê (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽 (8)
3. Patient report decryption
The attribute and the confidential key is used for
If a Patient attributes get matched with the index, then
encrypting the files are present in the tree. The doctors
Patient can compute the reportsby means of the follow-
have implemented the paring based cryptography and the
ing equation, F𝛼 = ê (g, g)t⋅e⋅S𝛽  . Each offspring node 𝛽 is
elliptic curve based cryptographic techniques. The elliptic
encrypted with attribute attn and the secret number S𝛽 . The
curve discrete logarithm hard problem is used. Thus the
decryption is computed by the following equations:
replay attack for thepatient submitted keyword is not pos-
�
CTn sible. Moreover, if hacker knows the attributes and the
attn = ciphertext he cant compute the confidential key due to
(9)
( )
ẽ CTy∗ ,F
elliptic curve bilinear diffie hellman problem.
F𝛽

3. Masqurade and man in the middle attack (MIM)

13
 N. Deepa, P. Pandiaraja

Table 4  Security comparison table

Various Protocol Attack based on mas- Attack based on Elliptic curve crypto- Multiple keys File privacy Hash
querade not possible Replay not possible graphic technique function
used

FFE Yes Yes No No Yes Yes

CABE Yes Yes No No Yes No
BCPABE No Yes No Yes No No
EPSE Yes No Yes No Yes Yes
FIBE No Yes No Yes No No
[PROPOSED] ERFC Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Table 5  Computation time of various protocols

Constraints Patient key computation Cloud working mechanism Doctor index building computation Patient report decryption

Approaches
 1. FFE 5texp + 3tmul tpar + texp + tmul 4texp + tpar + 3tmul tpar + texp + tmul
 2. CABE  3texp + tdiv + tpar tpar + tmul + texp tmul + tpar + 4texp + thash 2tpar + tadd + 4tdiv + tmul
 3. BCPABE 2tenc + 2tdiv tpar + tdiv + tmul tmul + texp tpar + 2tmul
 4. EPSE 4texp + tpar + 2tdiv tpar + 2tmul + texp 4texp + thash 2tpar + 2tmul + tdiv + tadd
 5. FIBE 2texp + tmul 2tpar + tmul + texp tpar + tmul + 4texp 2tpar + 3tmul + tdiv
 6. ERFC Proposed texp tpar tenc Tpar

The attributes are used for encrypting the files, so the 70

Key computationtime (ms)

hacker cant do the masqurade attack. If the hacker has to 60

hack the file, he should know the attributes. Alteration in 50

FFE
ciphertext files are impossible untill the hacker knows the 40
CABE
attribute. In the MIM, since we have used the elliptic curve 30
BCPABE
cryptography, which works based on the points, the MIM is 20 HMAABE
impossible because the files arecommunicatedthrough the 10 FIBE
paring based cryptography. The files are securely sent to the 0 PROPOSED(ERFC)

Patient by bilinear paring based technique.

00

00

00

00

00

00

00

00

00

0
00
10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90
10

protocols

6 Performance analysis Fig. 3  Patient key computation segment

In the performance analysis segment, computation complex-

ity of numerous protocols is calculated with respect to the
computation time. The ERFC computation time is calcu-
lated by language java, windows 10, processor: IntelCore
i2-3002U, RAM: 2.00 GB.
Table 5 concisely describes computation time required for
patient key computation, cloud working mechanism, doctor
index building and patient report decryption. Tadd—time
required for addition, texp—time required for exponential,
tsub—time required for subtraction, tmul—time required for
multiplication, tpar—time required for paring, tdiv—time
required for division, txor—time required for xorprocess,
tenc—encryption time, thash—time required for hashing.
Figure 3 represents the Patient Key time of Computa-
tion. The time of computation for FFE is 59 ms for 10,000
keywords, for CABE 40 ms, for BCPABE 32 ms, for EPSE
56 ms, for FIBE 21 ms, for our proposed (ERFC) the com-
putation time is 4 ms. Our proposed ERFC mechanism con-
sumes minimum time when comparing to existing protocols.
Figure 4 represents the Cloud Working Mechanism time.
The computation time for FFE is 33 ms for 10,000 keywords,
CABE takes 32  ms, BCPABE attains 41  ms, for EPSE
46 ms, FIBE consumes 49 ms, for our proposed protocol
(ERFC) the computation time is16ms. Our ERFC mecha-
nism takes minimum computation time when comparing to
existing mechanisms.
Figure 5 represents the Doctor Index Building Compu-
tation complexity. The computation complexity for FFE is
33 ms for 10,000 keywords, CABE takes 59 ms, BCPABE

13
E health care data privacy preserving efficient file retrieval from the cloud service provider…

45000
Cloud Service Provider Matching
50 40000 FFE

35000
40
FFE

Number of bits
30000 CABE
30 CABE 25000
time (ms)

20000 BCPABE
20 BCPABE
15000
HMAABE 10000 EPSE
10
FIBE 5000
0 0
PROPOSED(ERFC) FIBE
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

l
n

ng

ta
io
tio

tio

To
i

pt
ch
protocols

ta

yp

ry
at
PROPOSED(ER

pu

cr

ec
m
m

En

D
FC)

SP
co

C
ey
operations performed by various protocols

K
Fig. 4  Cloud working mechanism segment

Fig. 7  Communication complexity for various protocols

90
80 300000
70
PROPOSED(
Encryption time (ms)

250000

communication complexity
60 FFE ERFC)
FIBE
50 CABE 200000
40 BCPABE EPSE
150000
30 EPSE BCPABE
20 FIBE 100000 CABE
10 PROPOSED(ERFC)
50000 FFE
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
protocols 0
256 512 1024 2048 4096 8192
Number of bits
Fig. 5  Doctor index building computation segment
Fig. 8  Communication complexity for more number of bits

100
message transfer among the doctor and patient. Entire pro-
Decryption time (ms)

80
60
40
20
0 (2) Doctor Index Building Computation segment, (3) Cloud
1 2 3 4
Protocols
Fig. 6  Patient report decryption segment
requires 17 ms, for EPSE the computation time 35 ms, FIBE
needs 45 ms, for our proposed (ERFC) the computation time
is 12 ms, which clearly displays that our proposed protocol
has low computation complexity than other protocols.
Figure 6 represents the Patient Report Decryption time.
For the decryption segment, the computation time for FFE
is 58 ms for 10,000 keywords, CABE takes 94 ms, BCPABE
requires 42 ms, for EPSE the computation time 88 ms, FIBE
needs 83 ms, for our proposed (ERFC) the computation time
is 29 ms, which clearly displays that our proposed protocol
has low computation complexity than other protocols.
Figure 7 represents the Communication complexity for
various protocols. The computational time refers to complete
FFE
cesses in this research paper mention to hash, division, expo-
CABE
nentiation addition, subtraction, mod, paring and multipli-
BCPABE
cation. In elaborate manner, the total numbers of processes
EPSE
that take place in the (1) Patient Key Computation segment,
FIBE
PROPOSED(ERFC)
5 6 7 8 9 10 Working Mechanism segment and lastly (4) Patient Report
Decryption segment are taken into account for calculating
the time. The communication time is almost the amount of
bits essential to finish the message transfer between the doc-
tor and patient. The total quantity of bits used for computing
the communication time: FFE 7942, CABE 8482, BCPABE
4356, EPSE 8708, FIBE 8714 and Proposed ERFC2564. Our
proposed ERFC mechanism takes less communication time
than other mechanisms.
Figure 8 represents the Communication complexity for
more number of bits. The x-axis symbolizes the quantity of
bits require for the finishing the entire files procedure. X-axis
represents the bits from 256 to 8192. For FFE, the bits from
256 to 8192 computed are given as follows: 7942,15,884,
31,768, 63,536, 127,072, and 254,144. CABE is given as
follows:8482, 16,964, 33,928, 67,856, 135,712, and 271,424.
BCPABE is given as follows: 4356, 8712, 17,424, 34,848,
69,696, and 139,392. EPSE is given as follows: 8708,

13

17,416, 34,832, 69,664, 139,328, and 278,656. FIBE is
given as follows: 8714, 17,428, 34,856, 69,712, 139,424,
and 278,848. PROPOSED (ERFC) is given as follows:
2564, 5128, 10,256, 20,512, 41,024, and 82,048. Figure 8
indicates that the proposed ERFC mechanism consumes
minimum communication time when comparing to existing
mechanisms.
7 Conclusions and future works
An efficient retrieval of files from Cloud by using attrib-
ute based file encryption mechanism (ERFC) is developed.
We have developed key computation segment, the nature of
this segment is to calculate the key generation time for the
patient. From our performance analysis section it is clear that
our proposed ERFC has less computation complexity for key
generation segment when relating with other protocols. The
key generation segment, the computation time for FFE is
59 ms for 10,000 keywords, for CABE 40 ms, for BCPABE
32 ms, for EPSE 56 ms, for FIBE 21 ms, for our proposed
(ERFC) the computation time is 4 ms. From performance
analysis section, our proposed ERFC mechanism consumes
minimum time when comparing to existing mechanisms.
In addition to that we have developed encryption segment,
From Fig. 4, for the encryption segment, the computation
time for FFE is 33 ms for 10,000 keywords, CABE takes
59 ms, BCPABE requires 17 ms, for EPSE the computation
time 35 ms, FIBE needs 45 ms, for our proposed (ERFC)
the computation time is 12 ms, which clearly displays that
our proposed protocol has low computation complexity than
other protocols.
We have also developed semi trusted cloud segment for
increasing the security also to retrieve the encrypted files in
the hierarchical manner from the index tree. From Fig. 3, for
the semi trusted cloud matching segment computation time
for FFE is 33 ms for 10,000 keywords, CABE takes 32 ms,
BCPABE attains 41 ms, for EPSE 46 ms, FIBE consumes
49 ms, for our proposed protocol (ERFC) the computa-
tion time is 16 ms. From this we have proved our proposed
ERFC mechanism consumes minimum computation time
when comparing to existing mechanisms. We have finally
developed the decryption segment, for decrypting the files
from the cloud. From Fig. 5 for the decryption segment, the
computation time for FFE is 58 ms for 10,000 keywords,
CABE takes 94 ms, BCPABE requires 42 ms, for EPSE the
computation time 88 ms, FIBE needs 83 ms, for our pro-
posed (ERFC) the computation time is 29 ms, which clearly
displays our protocol achieves less computation time when
comparing to existing mechanisms. Future scope of our
research will be based on the real sets of data from the live
websites like credihealth.com. Since the huge amount of real
data’s are used the computation process will be challenging.
13
N. Deepa, P. Pandiaraja
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