The architecture and security of a mobile communication agent

This paper presents the architecture and analyzes the security of a mobile communication agent that is rich in communication interfaces, enabling a user to be connected to all his devices across different domains, such as a personal carry-on network, a home network and an office network. The agent can also be used as a gateway to interact with un-trusted network devices for services. The security of the agent itself depends on a cautious architectural design, a flash memory key used to save user's security configuration, and a password protected state transition. To protect the communications between the agent and other devices, encryption algorithms are selected based on trust-levels and performance needs.