Abstract

Air Smart Vehicular Networks (ASVNs) have become increasingly essentials in military and commercial industries in recent years, where drones are deployed to interact among each other via wireless medium in airspace due to their agility and versatility. ASVNs can form a closed loop from data perception to final execution by integrating communication devices, computation tools, and control modules. However, the used unencrypted and publicly available navigational signals like Global Positioning System (GPS) and communication over (public) insecure Internet connections, including wireless networks and WiFi, make ASVNs vulnerable to security breaches. Attackers can easily gain access to a drone's configuration and take control remotely, by launching various attacks such as GPS spoofing, false sensor data injection, maldrone malware injection, eavesdropping, man-in-the-middle, Denial-of-Service (DoS), replay, forgery, and Skyjack attacks. This paper proposes a robust and efficient multi-factor biometric-based security mechanism using blockchain as a service to address the security and privacy breaches in ASVNs. A comparative study demonstrates that the proposed scheme provides superior security and better functionality features with low communication and computation overheads as compared to the existing analogous schemes. The feasibility of the proposed scheme in real-life drone applications is also demonstrated through a real-time testbed and blockchain simulation. Furthermore, a detailed security analysis using the automated software validation tool, namely Scyther, verifies the proposed scheme's significant level of security

Abstract

Owing to the growth of the intelligent Internet of Vehicles (IoV), the notion of the Social Internet of Vehicles (SIoV) has emerged. SIoV is based on the intelligent IoV combined with social needs, and it uses existing vehicle self-organizing network technologies to enable in-vehicle social networking platforms. The rapid development of the Internet of Things (IoT) has led to an explosion in the number of in-vehicle electronic devices, external facilities, vehicles, and a massive amount of real-time data generated by these vehicles, devices, drivers, passengers, and other social relationships. This explosion has put tremendous load pressure on servers; hence, researchers have started to apply fog computing to SIoV to spread server overload. However, there are still a number of risks and challenges associated with SIoV. Therefore, we propose an authentication scheme for fog computing-enabled SIoV that guarantees user anonymity and security. Detailed security analysis proves that the proposed scheme can secure against known attacks. Finally, we evaluate the performance of our scheme, and the results show that it has excellent security, computation, and communication performances.

Abstract

The key factor accelerating the development of intelligent transportation and reduced traffic congestion is the vehicle ad hoc network (VANET). However, the swift upsurge in the diversity of vehicles puts the development of the vehicle network's safety system through plentiful glitches. To receive the messages promptly, attain the confidentiality of vehicle identity, and authentication swiftly in VANET, we present a new identity-based aggregate signature (IBAGS) system using the lattices. The proposed lattice-based method presented in this article combines the batch verification and aggregate signature scheme (ASS), which finishes the authentication of several vehicular units and aggregates multiple users' signatures into a single (compact) signature. This boosts the competence of the verification process. Furthermore, the vehicle pseudo-identities are also utilized to meet the goals of vehicle identity and privacy protection. Finally, dependable cloud storage technology efficiently enables the secure storing of message signatures. This article demonstrates the lower storage overhead and increases authentication efficiency while maintaining security compared to similar competing schemes.

Abstract

The rise of smart cities is directly connected to the increasing use of vehicles. The growing vehicle utilization has driven the emergence of Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANETs), facilitating instant information exchange among vehicles. The system provides essential information regarding road conditions, traffic patterns, and more relevant data. VANETs encompass two fundamental categories of communication exchanges, namely Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I). V2I technology facilitates the integration of cars and transportation infrastructure, enabling effective communication between vehicles and infrastructure. Nevertheless, the potential of V2I communication has various security concerns arising from prevalent security threats. Current authentication techniques encounter challenges regarding complexity, security, and privacy considerations. We designed a hash-based lightweight and anonymous authentication scheme to address the aforementioned restrictions and enhance the effectiveness of authentication in V2I architecture. This scheme effectively combines identity, password, and bio-metric to enhance resistance against impersonation, denial of service, and privileged insider attacks. The devised scheme distinguishes itself by a comparative analysis and security proofs, highlighting its superior capability in guaranteeing secure authentication in V2I communication. The comprehensive security analysis conducted formally and informally showcases the robustness of the proposed solution against several threats. The performance evaluation results show that our scheme demonstrates a decrease in the computational cost of 51.40% approximately and a reduction in communication overhead of around 22.57%. These results establish the efficiency and scalability of the proposed scheme as a viable solution for V2I architecture.

Abstract

The Internet of Nano Things (IoNT) is increasingly recognized as a superior alternative to the Internet of Things (IoT) due to its inherent benefits. However, the security of IoNT remains an open challenge that needs to be addressed at various levels. Given the highly sensitive data shared in IoNT, the development of security protocols becomes imperative. Despite the emergence of some methodologies, many security aspects have been overlooked, and no concrete cryptosystems have been developed. In this paper, we propose an Identity-Based Encryption (IBE) scheme built on the Learning With Errors (LWE) assumption. We design a lightweight protocol with the consideration of resource-constrained devices involved in the IoNT network. The proposed scheme is resistant to various attacks, including side-channel analysis, replay attacks, man-in-the-middle attacks, plaintext and ciphertext attacks, ensuring unforgeability. Additionally, performance evaluation indicates that the proposed scheme outperforms existing ones in terms of computational and communication costs.

Abstract

6G (sixth-generation wireless), the successor to 5G cellular technology, operates at higher frequencies than its predecessor and supports significantly greater capacity and markedly reduced latency. Healthcare is treated as a complex system with various stakeholders, like doctors, patients, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies as well as healthcare decision-makers. The innovations in the Internet of Things (IoT) and incorporating emerging technology in the healthcare systems provide the quality of services to the people and save millions of lives. However, patient privacy and secure interchange of medical data from various healthcare providers need to be adequately addressed. Furthermore, incorporating blockchain in the healthcare system helps to make the system more transparent and secure due to inherent properties of the blockchain. In addition, Big Data analytics helps in analyzing large datasets from hundreds of patients, and then in identifying various clusters and correlation among datasets, and also in developing predictive models. In this paper, we aim to propose a new smart contract-based access control for 6G-enabled blockchain assisted in the healthcare system (in short, we call it as SACS). SACS provides a patient to communicate with its healthcare management authority securely and helps to interchange his/her medical information across healthcare providers. A detailed security analysis, experimental results and comparative study assure that the proposed SACS is secure by preventing possible active and passive attacks, andrequires less computational and communication costs as compared to those for other relevant competing schemes.

Abstract

The next generation of Quantum Internet of Things (QIoT) has the potential to revolutionize various sectors, including smart homes, health-care, and smart cities, by enabling more sophisticated and interconnected systems. These applications incorporate advanced features, such as autonomous decision-making based on Quantum Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (QAI/ML) and context-aware functionality. The security of the data in these applications relies on traditional cryptographic techniques, which, however, face a growing threat due to the significant advancements in quantum computing, especially with the Shor's algorithm. This algorithm poses a substantial risk of breaking conventional cryptographic methods within a feasible timeframe. To address these emerging security challenges in the quantum realm, we propose a Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) based on the BB84 protocol. This approach aims to provide robust authentication using certificates through a classical channel and secure quantum key exchange via a quantum channel in a public environment. The proposed QKD scheme is implemented using a client-server model in Python and Qiskit, demonstrating its practicality in real-world applications. The obtained results showcase the successful establishment of a secure session key between IoT smart (sensor) devices and gateway nodes, effectively mitigating potential threats such as eavesdropping.

Abstract

The potency of digital twins to mitigate the shortcomings of traditional mobility systems, such as Vehicular Adhoc Network (VANET) can reconfigure it into an intelligent transportation domain with bolstered processing, storage capabilities and decision-making abilities. The vehicular digital network is emerging as the industrial revolution, where each real-mobile entity (i.e., vehicle) is connected in the virtual environment through their digital replica, known as a digital twin. The real-time data synchronization in the digital twin-centric approach is achieved via an open communication channel. Unfortunately, leveraging the virtual-reality synthesized security perils in the network which consequently obligates rigorous privacy and security countermeasures such as authentication, encryption and signature techniques. In this paper, we have suggested a blockchain-based authentication framework for intra-twin and inter-twin communication in vehicular digital twin networks, and the integrated blockchain in the system assures data compactness and verifiability. The security of the protocol is investigated under the real or random oracle model (ROR) and is confirmed secure with non-mathematical security analysis. Eventually, the operational competences and functionality features are inspected with relevant state-of-the-arts. The findings of study states excel computation and communication overhead of suggested system than others and is seemly for vehicular digital twin network.

Abstract

Quantum cryptography has the potential to secure the infrastructures that are vulnerable to various attacks, like classical attacks, including quantum-related attacks. Therefore, quantum cryptography seems to be a promising technology for the future secure online infrastructures and applications, like blockchain-based frameworks. In this article, we propose a generic quantum blockchain-envisioned security framework for an Internet of Things (IoT) environment. We then discuss some potential applications of the proposed framework. We also highlight the security advantages of quantum cryptography-based systems. We explain the working of blockchain, applications of blockchain, types of blockchain, the structure of blockchain, the structure of blockchain in a classical blockchain, and the structure of a block in a quantum blockchain context. Next, the adverse effects of quantum computing on the security of blockchain-based frameworks are highlighted. Furthermore, the comparisons of quantum cryptography-based security schemes, like quantum key distribution, quantum digital signature, and quantum hashing schemes, are provided. Finally, some future research directions related to the designed generic quantum blockchain-envisioned security framework for IoT are provided.

Abstract

The deployment of Agriculture 4.0 depends heavily on the adoption of the Internet of Things (IoT) and wireless sensors for increasing productivity and reducing costs of cultivation. Wearable plant sensors (WPSs), an IoT variant, can greatly optimize agricultural yields, sense early indications of disease, reduce waste, and minimize environmental concerns. Nonetheless, the induction of WPS into the plant fields always remains precarious for its open nature. We can witness many authentication protocols for agriculture setting, yet inefficient or insecure due to their vulnerability to known attacks. Most of these protocols lack privacy and perfect forward secrecy (PFS)-based significant features and are not suited for agricultural fields due to the utilization of complex crypto-primitives. Thus, to realize Agriculture 4.0 objectives, novel security solutions based on ultralight crypto-primitives are required. We propose an authentication protocol (SAWPS) for WPSs using Chinese remainder theorem (CRT) that is not only lightweight but also ensures privacy and PFS features. Moreoever, SAWPS is resistant to known attacks, including denial of service (DoS), ephemeral secret leakage, man-in-the-middle, impersonation, and forgery threats. The theoretical evaluation along with formal analysis based on real-or-random (RoR) model is provided for correctness and security. The performance results demonstrate efficiency and effectiveness of SAWPS over the comparative studies.