• Smart Media Journal
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.9-16
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• 2019

Apple provides its own protocol, the Bonjour protocol, for convenient file transmission and reception between device. Airdrop is a Bonjour-based, representative service that is widely used as a simple data transmission/reception protocol for Apple's desktops, laptops and smartphones. However, it was demonstrated in Black Hat, a hacking security conference in 2016, that it is possible to commence a Man-in-the-Middle attack by exploiting the Bonjour protocol's weak points. In this paper, we explain the Bonjour protocol's such vulnerability for secure file transmission/reception between devices and propose an ECDH (Elliptic Curve Diffie-Hellman) based authentication protocol to enhance the protocol's security. The proposed protocol is described along with detailed operational procedures, demonstrating that it is possible to reduce the possibility of Man-in-the-Middle attack and its masquerade variant.