An Asymmetric Key Establishment Protocol for Multiphase Self-Organized Sensor Networks

Abstract.

We propose an asymmetric key establishment protocol for decentralized sensor networks (DSN's). The protocol supports multiphase deployment i.e., the sensor nodes are deployed in the network in multiple groups, known as "generations''. After their deployment, the nodes of the first generation are engaged in a key establishment protocol, in order to establish secure communication channels with their neighbors. Then, each forthcoming generation initializes a new key establishment phase, which allows the new nodes to communicate with other nodes of their own generation as well as with the older nodes of the network. The protocol extends the hybrid scheme of Kotzanikolaou et al [KMDC]. By making the scheme of [KMDC] fully asymmetric, the proposed protocol corrects a security weakness found in [KMDC] while it does not induce further computation and communication costs.

Keywords: Distributed Sensor Networks, Security, Key Establishment, Key Management, Asymmetric Cryptography, Public Key Cryptography

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