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This paper introduces OmniSphinx, a novel mix network format that allows for the emulation of various existing mix formats within a single deployment, addressing the incompatibility issues of traditional packet formats. By enabling senders to embed processing instructions directly in their packets, OmniSphinx streamlines the infrastructure needed for anonymous communication while maintaining reasonable performance overhead. Empirical evaluations demonstrate that the overhead incurred by emulating the most compact format, Sphinx, is minimal, with only a 90渭s increase in computation time and a 33% increase in header size.
OmniSphinx allows for seamless emulation of multiple mix network formats, drastically simplifying the infrastructure needed for secure communication.
Mix networks are an important tool to implement anonymous communication, which protects not just the content but also the metadata of messages. Over time, various packet formats for mix networks have been proposed, usually with single, specific goals in mind. These formats are incompatible with each other, requiring separate software and infrastructure to be set up. In this paper, we propose a new format, OmniSphinx, which solves this issue. In OmniSphinx, senders embed code in their packets that determines how they must be processed. The resulting active mix network can emulate any other mix format within a single deployment. Our empirical evaluation shows that emulation in OmniSphinx incurs reasonable overhead compared to native execution for typical mix network use cases: For Sphinx, the most compact format, computation time increases by around 90{\mu}s, while headers increase by 33% in size.
