1. A method, comprising: receiving, by a router of an information-centric network, an Interest via a first interface of the router; determining, for the Interest, a first anonymous identifier (AID) that identifies a name-independent path to the Interest's source via the router; identifying a second interface for forwarding the Interest to a next-hop neighbor via the information-centric network; performing a bijective function on the first AID to obtain a second AID that is to be used by the next-hop neighbor to establish a name-independent return path to the router; updating the Interest to include the second AID; and forwarding the Interest via the second interface toward the next-hop neighbor.