A framework towards adaptable and delegated end-to-end transport-layer security for Internet-integrated Wireless Sensor Networks

Authors

Abstract

Sensing applications envisioned for the Internet of Things (IoT) are expected to employ constrained wireless sensing devices and require appropriate security mechanisms protecting end-to-end communications between Internet hosts and much more constrained wireless sensing devices. While noting that technologies designed at standardization groups such as 6LoWPAN (IPv6 over Low power Wireless Personal Area Networks) and CoRE (Constrained RESTful Environments) are able to support end-to-end standard Internet communications involving constrained wireless sensing devices, several important security issues remain to be addressed before interconnecting a WSN with the Internet. In this paper we discuss a framework supporting the usage of mechanisms providing secure communications in the context of Internet-interconnected WSN. We also address the usage of adaptable end-to-end transport-layer security supporting delegated ECC public-key authentication. The proposed mechanisms are experimentally evaluated against their impact on the energy of constrained sensing devices.

Keywords

End-to-end transport-layer security, wireless sensor networks, delegated public-key authentication, 6LoWPAN, DTLS, CoAP.

Subject

Wireless Sensor Networks, security, Internet of Things, DTLS, transport-layer security

Conference

Second Joint ERCIM eMobility and MobiSense Workshop - WWIC 2013, June 2013