Secure Authentication in Wireless Sensor Networks Using Blockchain Technology

Introduction

In terms of expediting the internet and technology, the Internet of Things has emerged as a major force for promoting economic and social developments (Zawaideh et al., 2018). Wireless Sensor Network (WSNs) as the key technology in the IoT-architecture plays an essential role in fostering IoT development with remarkable real importance and research value. Mobile, ad hoc network sensors (MANETs) are distributed micro-device systems that have the characteristics of the wider range of sensors, rapid deployment, remote monitoring, high-precision monitoring, high tolerance faults, and self-organization (Zeng et al., 2018) (Su et al., 2018). WSNs have been widely used in a variety of fields, including military, smart home, commercial, and others (Prabha et al., 2017). The sensor nodes, even so, share similar restrictions – they are damaged easily and possess limited capacity, computer skill, memory, and range of transmission (Zhang et al., 2017). Besides, an opponent can easily compromise them (Anu and Vimla, 2019). Statistics show that there are mainly two aspects to the threats faced by the WSN (Das and Das, 2015) (Jaint et al., 2019). The external Network attacker on the one hand invades the internal node and regulates it to become an inside malicious node to start a strike. Consequently, it is an urgent security problem for networks of wireless sensors to identify and delete internal malicious nodes. And the healthy development of IoT has a profound impact on how this security threat can be resolved. That is why many scientists were made aware of the safety of the WSN's network (Chen et al, 2013).

Blockchain technology makes great tact of researchers, as the researchers have believed in that technology, this will introduce noticeable changes and changes to industries. In a decentralized fashion, Blockchain technology is very effective for settling trusted communications. Back in 2008, this technology was proposed and disseminated by the cryptography mailing group. Decentralization is the key capability of blockchain technology, which permits transactions directly peer to peer. In distributed systems, this approach is also utilized in the system which requires trust for nodes to do transactions. There are several means adopted by the Blockchain technology like a distributed consensus, time stamping, economic incentives, and data encryption. It is used in solving the problems like insecure data storage, high cost, and inefficiency. The research on this technology is excited to grow rapidly by the quick development and acclaim of blockchain (Pinto et al., 2018).

WNS (Wireless Sensor Network) includes various kinds of small sensing devices, that are being used for monitoring the physical conditions. smart cities, medicine military purpose, and monitoring an environment are the Applications of the WSNs. The Sensing nodes are installed in the required manner (may be static or random) for the prospect of monitoring, recognizing, and fetching information. It has some problems like routing, void holes, connectivity, small memory, throughput, and most dominantly the issues of security. The threats encountered by the WSNs mostly come from two sources. Firstly, the internal nodes of the network become malicious, and secondly, the external attacks on the network.

When a malicious node gets packets of data from a neighboring node, it discards packets directly and stops forwarding the packets of data to its next-hop neighboring node. This produces a “black hole” data in the network and their detection is very hard for the routing nodes in the WSNs.