Towards efficient security services in wireless sensor networks

Abstract

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are infrastructure-less and fully distributed systems of self-configurable and self-organizing nodes that wish to exchange information over the air. Security in WSN is challenging, because of its special characteristics, and due to the scarcity of energy and processing power. Many WSN scenarios demand authentication, confidentiality and integrity services. In this paper, we introduce a framework to address these main security services based on a special protocol that integrates public key and symmetric key algorithms to ensure optimal usage of sensors' energy and processing power, and provide adequate security. The proposed framework utilizes Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) and AES to achieve a reasonable tradeoff. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.