LSTR: Lightweight and Secure Tree-Based Routing for Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

This paper proposes a Lightweight and Secure Tree-based Routing protocol (LSTR) for Wireless Sensor Networks. The security of data routing from sensor nodes to the Base Station (BS) is achieved based on an efficient ID-based authenticated key-agreement protocol. LSTR reduces the number of required keys to a single permanent private-key preloaded in sensor nodes. This key is used subsequently to generate authenticated pairwise keys with other nodes without further digital signatures or certificates. As a result, LSTR achieves both node’s authenticity and confidentiality during data delivery at low cost and without involving the BS. In addition, a single message must be transmitted by the nodes for both the routing-tree construction and key-establishment at the same time, and which reduces the communication overheads. The performance analysis results show that LSTR reduces the storage requirements, the communication overheads and the energy dissipation compared to similar relevant works, particularly during the key-establishment. Additionally, the robustness of our scheme is highlighted through a security analysis.