An efficient, secure and trusted channel protocol for avionics wireless networks

Abstract

Abstract-Avionics networks rely on a set of stringent reliability and safety requirements. In existing deployments, most of these networks are based on a wired technology, which supports these requirements. Furthermore, this technology simplifies the security management of the network since certain assumptions can be safely made, including the inability of an attacker to access the network, and the fact that it is almost impossible for an attacker to introduce a node into the network. The proposal for Avionics Wireless Networks (AWNs, currently under consideration by multiple aerospace working groups, promises a reduction in the complexity of electrical wiring harness design and fabrication, a reduction in the total weight of wires, increased customization possibilities, and the capacity to monitor otherwise inaccessible moving or rotating aircraft parts such as landing gear and some sections of the aircraft engines. While providing these benefits, the AWN must ensure that it provides levels of safety that are at minimum equivalent to those offered by the wired equivalent. In this paper, we propose a secure and trusted channel protocol that satisfies the stated security and operational requirements for an AWN protocol. There are three main objectives for this protocol. First, the protocol has to provide the assurance that all communicating entities can trust each other, and can trust their internal (secure) software and hardware states. Second, the protocol has to establish a fair key exchange between all communicating entities so as to provide a secure channel. Finally, the third objective is to be efficient for both the initial start-up of the network and when resuming a session after a cold and/or warm restart of a node. The proposed protocol is implemented within a demo AWN, and performance measurements are presented based on this implementation. In addition, we formally verify our proposed protocol using CasperFDR.

Survey on Collaborative Smart Drones and Internet of Things for Improving Smartness of Smart Cities

“…In the case of detection systems, co-location proofs were proposed to act against routing attacks by [142], [143]. The authors of [143] discussed the security services applied in the link layer including E2E security, while the authors of [144] proposed secure channel protocols to ensure robust communication. For securing the network layers of drone and IoT collaborative set-ups, the authors of [134] discussed secure routing, IP security, and secure transportation.…”

Wireless Connectivity in Airplanes: Challenges and the Case for UWB

“…Significant efforts have been devoted to tackle these vulnerabilities through cryptography with contributions ranging from side by side comparisons of secure channel protocols for avionics [26] to general adversarial testing methodologies that propose a proactive approach to security to minimize the overall threats of IoT systems [27]. Furthermore, some protocols proposed shed light into practical implementation for the aeronautics [28], [29]. Despite these valuable contributions, ensuring security in a WSN through cryptography continues to be difficult due to the usually small payload messages, which lead to high overhead.…”

UAV IoT Framework Views and Challenges: Towards Protecting Drones as “Things”

“…In the link/adoption layer, important security services have to be applied in the 6LoWPAN adoption layer, including end-to-end security, continuous authentication schemes [ 44 , 45 ], trust verification/validation, and key management mechanisms [ 37 ]. To provide robust communication and endpoint security, secure and trusted channel protocols were proposed in Reference [ 46 ]. Furthermore, group key management techniques were considered in Reference [ 38 ], aiming to enable multicast communication using CoAP.…”