Towards Secure Internet of Things

Abstract

Internet of Things (IoT) has transformed the network into a new pathway by connecting the surrounding smart objects to enable smart services that act spontaneously. The connection between these objects is contributing to shaping a new data-driven society. The IoT network is an open-access network, where the individual users not only use the services offered but also contribute their devices to support IoT applications. Deploying IoT applications on this open network is vulnerable to various security attacks and privacy issues. The existing techniques that protect the IoT application and data within the IoT network are based on a centralized architecture that is prone to tampering. Thus, securing the IoT applications and data is still an open challenge. Blockchain, based on decentralization principles, and tamperproof distributed ledger can be helpful to strengthen the security of IoT. The secure cryptographic primitives on an immutable digital ledger in blockchain are nearly impossible or very difficult to alter. Such tamperproof ledgers can make IoT environment more secure, where network security assurance is more challenging due to limited resources in IoT devices and the huge scale and distributed nature of IoT network. On the other hand, blockchain technology has high computational overhead, excessive bandwidth consumption, and computation delay. It is still an open research challenge to understand the tradeoffs of using blockchain technology in securing IoT applications. As such, in this work, we review the current state-of-the-art solutions in securing IoT applications, using blockchain. Besides, we discuss challenges and open issues that need to be addressed to secure IoT applications by utilizing blockchain technology.