A Security-Enhanced Query Result Verification Scheme for Outsourced Data in Location-Based Services

Location-based services (LBSs) facilitate people’s lives; location-based service providers (LBSPs) usually outsource services to third parties to provide better services. However, the third party is a dishonest entity that might return incorrect or incomplete query results under the consideration of saving storage space and computation resources. In this paper, we propose a security-enhanced query result verification scheme (SEQRVS) for the outsourced data in a LBS. Specifically, while retaining fine-grained query result verification, we improve the construction process of verification objects to enhance the security of the outsourced data. To prevent the third party from deducing the knowledge of the outsourced data stored in itself (statistically), our scheme designs a novel storage structure to enhance the ability of privacy preservation for the outsourced data. Furthermore, based on the secure keyword search and query result verification mode proposed in our scheme, the user cannot only verify the correctness and completeness of the query result but also achieve consistency verification by the blockchain. Finally, the security analysis and extensive simulation results show the security and practicality of the proposed scheme.