A blockchain-based user-centric identity management toward 6G networks✩

Guoqiang Zhang; Qiwei Hu; Yu Zhang; Tao Jiang

doi:10.1016/j.dcan.2025.05.009

›› 2026, Vol. 12 ›› Issue (1) :1 -10. DOI: 10.1016/j.dcan.2025.05.009

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A blockchain-based user-centric identity management toward 6G networks^✩

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Research Center of 6G Mobile Communications, School of Cyber Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China

^* E-mail addresses: sinc_zhanggq@hust.edu.cn (G. Zhang), qiweihu@hust.edu.cn (Q. Hu), yuzhang123@hust.edu.cn (Y. Zhang), tao.jiang@ieee.org (T. Jiang).

Guoqiang Zhang is currently a doctor student of engineering with the Research Cen-ter of 6G Mobile Communications and School of Cyber Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China. He is interested in digital identity management and authentication, blockchain, and privacy-protection.

Qiwei Hu is currently a postdoc researcher in the School of Cyber Science and En-gineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, China. He received his Ph.D. degree in Information and Communication Engineering from HUST in 2023. His research interests lie in distributed ledger technology, particularly its applica-tions in access control.

Yu Zhang received the M.Eng. and Ph.D. degrees from Huazhong University of Sci-ence and Technology (HUST), where he is serving as a postdoctoral researcher. His research interests include cell-free massive MIMO communications and backscatter com-munications 430074, China.

Tao Jiang is currently a Chair Professor with the Research Center of 6G Mobile Com-munications and School of Cyber Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China. He has authored/co-authored about 500 papers in ma-jor journals/conferences. He served as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Network, IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing, IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials and IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology.

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Abstract

The developing Sixth-Generation (6G) network aims to establish seamless global connectivity for billions of humans, machines, and devices. However, the rich digital service and the explosive heterogeneous connection between various entities in 6G networks can not only induce increasing complications of digital identity management, but also raise material concerns about the security and privacy of the user identity. In this paper, we design a user-centric identity management that returns the sole control to the user self and achieves identity sovereignty toward 6G networks. Specifically, we propose a blockchain-based Identity Management (IDM) architecture for 6G networks, which provides a practical method to secure digital identity management. Subsequently, we develop a fully privacy-preserving identity attribute management scheme by using zero-knowledge proof to protect the privacy-sensitive identity attribute. In particular, the scheme achieves an identity attribute hiding and verification protocol to support users in obtaining and applying their identity attributes without revealing concrete data. Finally, we analyze the security of the proposed architecture and implement a prototype system to evaluate its performance. The results demonstrate that our architecture ensures eﬀective user digital identity management in 6G networks.

Keywords

The sixth generation (6G) network / User-centric identity management / Blockchain / Decentralized identity / Privacy preservation

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Guoqiang Zhang, Qiwei Hu, Yu Zhang, Tao Jiang. A blockchain-based user-centric identity management toward 6G networks^✩. , 2026, 12(1): 1-10 DOI:10.1016/j.dcan.2025.05.009

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CRediT authorship contribution statement

Guoqiang Zhang: Validation, Methodology, Formal analysis, Data curation, Conceptualization. Qiwei Hu: Writing-review & editing, Resources, Methodology, Formal analysis. Yu Zhang: Writing-review & editing, Resources, Funding acquisition. Tao Jiang: Writing-review & editing, Supervision, Resources, Methodology, Funding acquisition.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

The author is an Associate Editor for [Digital Communications and Networks] and was not involved in the editorial review or the decision to publish this article.

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