LoRaWAN Protocol Research Articles

Investigation on Security Risk of LoRaWAN: Compatibility Scenarios

The LoRaWAN standard comes from a Low Power Wide Area Network (LPWAN) technology suitable for developing Internet of Things (IoT) systems that are poised to disrupt the semiconductor industry. Even as a widespread technology used for diverse applications, security issues of long range (LoRa) networks and devices still remain a major challenge. Although the LoRa-Alliance enhanced the security and the network architecture of LoRaWAN from version 1.0 to version 1.1, the last version still faces some drawbacks such as being vulnerable to attacks. Some works in the literature have assessed LoRaWAN (v1.0 and v1.1) security risks and vulnerabilities. Moreover, all these specifications must coexist with each other, which makes compatibility an important factor in ensuring the sustainability of this technology. It is for this reason that we study the vulnerability of the LoRaWAN protocol in the context of compatibility. Hence, We consider four compatibility scenarios and possible cyber-attacks when connecting devices from the two mentioned versions. In this paper, we analyze the LoRaWAN architectures and then discuss the basic security concepts related to the compatibility scenarios between homogeneous or heterogeneous systems integrating the two LoRaWAN versions. After that, we investigate and then identify the potential security risks and network vulnerabilities in LoRaWAN technology. We establish a catalog of vulnerabilities for LoRaWAN on a methodological framework. The catalog contains 5 vulnerabilities related to LoRaWAN v1.0.x and v1.1 and 7 vulnerabilities related to LoRaWAN v1.0.x. After that, we check if these vulnerabilities could be applied to the compatibility scenarios. We observe that the majority of vulnerabilities mitigated in LoRaWAN v1.1 remain present in the compatibility scenarios.

A Performance Analysis of Edge Computing Compression Methods for Environmental Monitoring Nodes with LoRaWAN Communications

Data compression methods applied with wavelet transforms, redundant point removal, or neural networks are potential edge computing solutions whose main advantages are minimization of the amount of data transmitted in wireless sensor networks and the reduction of energy requirements and consumption. Implemented as central computational unit, the microcontroller used in such systems compresses the data, specifically temperature data, acquired from environmental monitoring. The proposed compression methods can achieve up to 93% data compression at a mean squared error value of approximately 0.1. The method was designed to satisfy the requirements of the LoRaWAN protocol and the size of the data payload.

Microclimate Monitoring System Design for the Smart Grid Analysis and Constructive Parameters Estimation

This paper describes a microclimate monitoring system consisting of a LoRaWAN network of wireless climate sensors, a data collector and analytical software. The system is a part of the ICS RAS SmartGrid Centre project for predicting building energy consumption. During the design phase, the authors considered the concept of comfort, which is involved in setting control objectives for HVAC plants. It was necessary to overcome some characteristics of the LoRaWAN protocol, such as floating data transmission period and limited intensity of sensor communication. These have been overcome by post-processing the data with Python software, using libraries numpy and scipy. The collected data was passed through an interpolation filter for synchronization, and the resulting data is freely available in dataset format on our website for all interested researchers. Additionally, weather data was collected using a local meteostation to be considered as external disturbances in analysis problems. This paper also considers an approach to passive identification of the thermal protection parameters of a building. The coronavirus lockdown period was chosen to assume the impact of visitors negligible. The parameters are supposed to be estimated by correlation analysis. The estimates obtained should be compared with the values calculated according to ISO and Russian construction standards for diagnostic reasons.

Air quality monitoring system for IOT based smart city applications

It is critical to keep essential air pollutants within the World Health Organization's (WHO) prescribed levels in order to counteract the rising number of people killed by the accompanying health concerns. This is particularly true in enclosed spaces, wherein poor ventilation can amplify the impacts of pollutants. Knowing the amount of contaminants in the air would be a good starting point for taking measures to mitigate. This paper proposes a domestic air pollution monitoring system based on the Internet of Things framework. Two CO2 and PM2.5 sensor that are essential for air pollution monitoring with adjusted air quality forecasting are being sent to the cloud via a LoRaWAN protocol compatible gateways that connects the sensor to the server side of the network. The designed Web-based user interface dashboards enable the users to query the system and retrieve data as well as analytical data. Baseline techniques are designed and deployed to make it easier to configure triggers for each sensor node and transmit notifications when a measured parameter surpasses a defined threshold value.

Large-Scale Internet of Things Multi-Sensor Measurement Node for Smart Grid Enhancement.

Electric power infrastructure has revolutionized our world and our way of living has completely changed. The necessary amount of energy is increasing faster than we realize. In these conditions, the grid is forced to run against its limitations, resulting in more frequent blackouts. Thus, urgent solutions need to be found to meet this greater and greater energy demand. By using the internet of things infrastructure, we can remotely manage distribution points, receiving data that can predict any future failure points on the grid. In this work, we present the design of a fully reconfigurable wireless sensor node that can sense the smart grid environment. The proposed prototype uses a modular developed hardware platform that can be easily integrated into the smart grid concept in a scalable manner and collects data using the LoRaWAN communication protocol. The designed architecture was tested for a period of 6 months, revealing the feasibility and scalability of the system, and opening new directions in the remote failure prediction of low voltage/medium voltage switchgears on the electric grid.

Firmware Update Using Multiple Gateways in LoRaWAN Networks

The remarkable evolution of the IoT raised the need for an efficient way to update the device’s firmware. Recently, a new process was released summarizing the steps for firmware updates over the air (FUOTA) on top of the LoRaWAN protocol. The FUOTA process needs to be completed quickly to reduce the systems’ interruption and, at the same time, to update the maximum number of devices with the lowest power consumption. However, as the literature showed, a single gateway cannot optimize the FUOTA procedure and offer the above mentioned goals since various trade-offs arise. In this paper, we conducted extensive experiments via simulation to investigate the impact of multiple gateways during the firmware update process. To achieve that, we extended the FUOTAsim simulation tool to support multiple gateways. The results revealed that several gateways could eliminate the trade-offs that appeared using a single gateway.

Refined Node Energy Consumption Modeling in a LoRaWAN Network.

LPWAN technologies such as LoRa are widely used for the deployment of IoT applications, in particular for use cases requiring wide coverage and low energy consumption. To minimize the maintenance cost, which can become significant when the number of sensors deployed is large, it is essential to optimize the lifetime of nodes, which remains an important research topic. For this reason, it is necessary that it is based on a fine energy consumption model. Unfortunately, many existing consumption models do not take into account the specifications of the LoRaWAN protocol. In this paper, a refined energy consumption model based on in-situ measurements is provided for a LoRaWAN node. This improved model takes into account the number of nodes in the network, the collision probability that depends on the density of sensors, and the number of retransmissions. Results show the influence of the number of nodes in a LoRaWAN network on the energy consumption of a node and demonstrate that the number of sensors that can be integrated into a LoRaWAN network is limited due to the probability of collision.

LoRaWAN ESL for Food Retail and Logistics

Electronic shelf labels (ESL, or electronic price tag) are used by retailers for displaying product pricing on shelves substituting printed price tags; each ESL can display not only the price, but also text, and images, and can be remotely updated, configured, and programmed from a central server. Additionally, the emerging IoT paradigm, allows to expand the application horizon. Firstly, this work presents an analysis on how the use of Cloud-connected, intelligent, ESLs can improve food logistics in the complex scenarios of medium and large cities. Then, a low-cost ESL device, using an electronic ink (e-ink) display and the LoRaWAN protocol to communicate with the central server, aimed at price display and innovative applications in food retail and logistics, is presented. Several current consumption and communication distance measurements are shown, and the design and configuration space are explored to optimize battery life and communication reliability in the different food distribution scenarios. The proposed ESL is powered with a 500mA ·h LiMnO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> battery that can last for >8 years in a typical application, considering it communicates with a central server once per hour. The developed price tag can dynamically update the price and information for the customer, which in the case of food can be used to minimize spoilage and can easily upgraded to incorporate sensors or smartphone interaction to develop innovative food logistics and marketing practices. Finally, a LoRaWAN time-slot allocation strategy is presented, to minimize collisions when thousand nodes are connected to a single gateway, with a minimum power consumption overhead.

Monitoring Soil and Ambient Parameters in the IoT Precision Agriculture Scenario: An Original Modeling Approach Dedicated to Low-Cost Soil Water Content Sensors.

A low power wireless sensor network based on LoRaWAN protocol was designed with a focus on the IoT low-cost Precision Agriculture applications, such as greenhouse sensing and actuation. All subsystems used in this research are designed by using commercial components and free or open-source software libraries. The whole system was implemented to demonstrate the feasibility of a modular system built with cheap off-the-shelf components, including sensors. The experimental outputs were collected and stored in a database managed by a virtual machine running in a cloud service. The collected data can be visualized in real time by the user with a graphical interface. The reliability of the whole system was proven during a continued experiment with two natural soils, Loamy Sand and Silty Loam. Regarding soil parameters, the system performance has been compared with that of a reference sensor from Sentek. Measurements highlighted a good agreement for the temperature within the supposed accuracy of the adopted sensors and a non-constant sensitivity for the low-cost volumetric water contents (VWC) sensor. Finally, for the low-cost VWC sensor we implemented a novel procedure to optimize the parameters of the non-linear fitting equation correlating its analog voltage output with the reference VWC.

Construction of Open-pit Mine Environmental Monitoring System Based on Wireless Sensor Network

Green mining in mines should be combined with the emerging new technologies and methods to collect, store and display mine environmental data, so as to achieve the balance between mine economic benefits and environmental protection. In this paper, low power sensor nodes are deployed on a large scale in mines, which is based on LoRaWAN protocol wireless sensor network to build mine environment monitoring system of internet of things. Energy collection, energy management and storage of monitoring nodes are designed to realize self-sufficiency of power supply of monitoring nodes. The single chip microcomputer of the monitoring node reads the sensor data and sends it to the gateway and server, and then the client application program realizes data storage and display of mine monitoring node position, rainfall, PM2.5, temperature and humidity in two dimensions of time and space.

Towards Dependable IoT via Interface Selection: Predicting Packet Delivery at the End Node in LoRaWAN Networks.

Estimating channel conditions to predict packet delivery can be exploited as a powerful tool to ensure wireless networks dependability. In this article we explore the practical application of this idea from the end-device perspective, using the LoRaWAN protocol stack. We aim to understand if packet delivery can be estimated considering different levels of feedback at the end-device. For that, an extensive data collection campaign is carried out. Through an analysis of the obtained traces, we establish correlations between connectivity metrics at the end node and the fact that a packet is received at the gateway. The study is complemented considering different levels of feedback: (i) No feedback, (ii) enabling acknowledgements frames, and (iii) considering application/control plane data about the channel status at the gateway side. The results show that it is possible to estimate packet delivery in all the evaluated cases.

An Easily Integrable Industrial System for Gamma Spectroscopic Analysis and Traceability of Stones and Building Materials.

In the building material and stones market, lots of restrictions are coming in different world zones. In Europe, a recent regulatory set up the maximum level of radiological emissions for materials intended for use in public and private building structures. For this reason, companies need to have a very efficient radiological measurements system in their production chain, in order to respect all the rules and to be competitive in the world market. This article describes CORSAIR, a Cloud-Oriented Measurement System for Radiological Investigation and Traceability of Stones. Our cyber-physical system consists of sensing nodes network connected to a data collection gateway through LoRaWAN protocol, and interfaces with a centralized cloud application. CORSAIR introduces a fast, repeatable, real-time and non-destructive method to measure radiological emissions and other parameters of each single building material item, uniquely identified by an applied RFID tag. The validity of this system is confirmed by in-situ measurement campaign compared with high-precision laboratory analysis. The results demonstrate the accuracy of the CORSAIR sensor and the possibility to easily integrate it in the company production chain without any change.

IoT protection based on Lora Wan

The paper analyzes the life cycle of IOT devices, IOT software development cycle, analyzes threats and technologies of device protection, as well as LoRaWAN protocol, ways of device interaction, network architecture and ways of information protection within this protocol. The main stages of the IOT device life cycle, the stages of IOT software development in the context of information security and the threats that may arise at different stages of the IOT device life cycle are studied. Recommendations and proposals for the organization of processes of interaction with stakeholders, directly on the processes of obtaining a particular IoT device in the security context, and reviewed technologies for the protection of IoT devices based on the LoRaWAN protocol.

Envisioning IoT applications in a smart city to underpin an effective municipal strategy: The smartbin project

Due to the Earth’s population rapid growth and the modern lifestyle, the urban waste creation rate constantly increases.Organic waste, which forms a significant part of municipal solid waste, has caused increasing environmental concerns. Recycling is the only way to make a sustainable environment. According to estimations from the United States Environmental Protection Agency, around 24 percent of the total waste can be composted. Instead, most of it is land filled and incinerated. By composting organic waste,we can preserve resources and produce a valuable by-product that can be used as a locally produced fertilizer. In this paper, we propose a solution: a low-cost and effective Smart Compost Bin that utilizes modern technologies, such as environmental sensors and the LoRaWAN protocol to assist with the compost process.A centralized Information System collects measurements from smart bins that can be deployed anywhere and can further assist with the waste collection process. We have performed several experiments with our smart bin prototype, evaluated its efficiency and concluded that it is a feasible solution.

A study of LoRaWAN protocol performance for IoT applications in smart agriculture

The use of Internet of Things (IoT) is becoming increasingly common in agribusiness to increase food production capacity for the expanding global population. Recently, low-power wide-area networks (LPWANs) have been used in the development of IoT applications that require low power consumption and low data transmission rates. LoRaWAN is considered the most suitable communication network for LPWANs for IoT applications in smart agriculture. In this paper, we present an in-depth study of the performance of the LoRaWAN communication network in the context of an IoT application for a pilot farm. We consider several scenarios and analyze simulation results by using Network Simulator 3. We then propose a mathematical model that precisely predicts the successful packet delivery rate for this type of network considering the number of nodes and the transmission interval duration. Finally, we validate the results of our model by comparing them with other simulation results under different scenarios.

Сomparative Analysis of LPWAN technologies

The scope of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies is expanding year by year. One such area is the engineering of systems for collecting and transmitting information from various sensors for further processing and possible control of technological systems. Examples of such systems are "smart city" systems, environmental pollution control systems, natural disasters forecasting systems, soil moisture systems, etc. The technologies and protocols for building such systems must, first and foremost, be characterized by low energy consumption and cover large territorial areas. The technology of this class is commonly known as LPWAN (Low-power Wide-area Network). This paper solves the problem of analyzing the features of LPWAN technologies by the criteria: openness, coverage range, data rate and deployment cost, for further use in the construction of engineering systems for collecting and transmitting information from various sensors for further processing and possible control of technological systems. It is determined that the selected criteria is most consistent with the LoRaWAN protocol. Compared to other standards, LoRaWAN is the most open standard for creating small private networks. If we are building a LoRa specification network and we have a third-party device that responds to it, then the device in our network is quietly activated and can work. LoRa technology uses frequency bands that do not require licensing. A typical LoRaWAN network consists of the following elements: end devices, gateways, network server, application server.Features of Lora modulation used at the physical layer of the LoRaWAN protocol are considered. LoRa is a "chirp spread spectrum (CSS)" modulation . This is a spread spectrum technique that uses broadband linear frequency modulated (chirp) pulses to encode information.The network architecture is also analyzed in terms of the ability to create your own hardware components. It should be noted that LoRaWAN does not allow communication between devices: packets can only be transmitted from the end device to the network server or vice versa. Thus, communication between devices can only be implemented through an intermediate network server.The openness of LoRaWAN enables you to create your own network components, most notably end devices and gateways, using available technical and hardware solutions that provide the necessary parameters. For example, a Raspberry Pi microcomputer (an estimated cost of $ 38) can be used to build a gateway and an Arduino microcontroller ($ 3) to create end nodes with appropriate sensors.

CITY STREET LAYOUT DEVELOPMENT UNDER THE CONTROL OF “SMART STREET” DATA ACQUISITION SYSTEM

Проблематика. Одной из важных задач местной власти является сокращение использования энергии и человеческих ресурсов в сфере уличных услуг. Решение этой проблемы требует разработки прототипа системы управления, которая позволит более эффективно распределить ресурсы, необходимые для поддержания улицы в надлежащем виде. Разработка и реализация такой системы возможна благодаря использованию концепции Интернет вещей. Цель исследований. Целью работы является создание усовершенствованного прототипа системы управления улицами на основе 3D-макета города. Методика реализации. Особое внимание исследования уделяется выбору протокола обмена данными, пошаговой настройке топологических слоев системы мониторинга, а также разработке и объединению компонентов макета улицы. Результаты исследований. Несколько собранных и персонально запрограммированных модулей конечных узлов были разработаны как часть первого слоя топологии системы. Выводы. В статье предлагается использовать протокол LoRaWAN для передачи данных от разработанных датчиков в центр обработки. Тестирование разработанного прототипа системы управления показало удовлетворительные результаты в области надежности связи, времени работы датчиков от внутреннего электропитания и возможности интеграции различных подсистем.

Ultra‐dense LoRaWAN: Reviews and challenges

Internet of Things (IoT) is one of the most cited terms within the communication research communities. Next generation wireless networks technologies are expected to have massive-connections of tens of billions of devices. Such a huge number of devices raised a number of concerns in regards to how much accessible resources are available and what are the best technologies for managing those resources, all in order to avoid shutdowns/collapses in every means. In terms of wireless networks, and in regards to energy being the backbone of IoT devices, Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN) technologies are considered to be a potential solution for IoT applications. In particular, this study reviews Long-Range (LoRa) technology and advances in the literature of LoRaWAN protocol to date. Furthermore, it discusses the challenges in LoRaWAN and diverts the attention towards applying Ultra-Dense Network concept on LPWAN.

LoRa-Based WSNs Construction and Low-Power Data Collection Strategy for Wetland Environmental Monitoring

The wetland that known as "the kidney of the earth" is an ecological system with many resources. Monitoring of wetland environment includes the monitoring of water quality, air and soil. The parameters of temperature, pH value, turbidity, dissolved oxygen (DO), water level, conductivity of water, illuminance, PM2.5, harmful gas, and soil moisture is particularly important for the survival of animals in wetland. Real-time monitoring wetland environment is conducive to understanding the causes and trends of environmental change in the whole region, so as to make environmental change emergency strategies timely. The author introduces a real-time monitoring system based on Multi-sensor Combination Module (MSCM) and LoRa. This system has two types of MSCM, one is for water and the other is for air. The MSCM for water consists of six sensors, such as water temperature sensor, pH sensor, turbidity sensor, dissolved oxygen sensor, conductivity sensor, and water level sensor, and stm32 core processor, which has the advantages of low power consumption and high speed. The data collection node uploads the collected data to the base station through a LoRa module with low power consumption, high speed and wide coverage. The base station and the collection node are connected in a star. The LoRaWan protocol is used to realize the communication between acquisition nodes and sink. In the case of code rate is 4/5, bandwidth is 500 kHz and spreading factor is 12, the effective throughput of the system can reach 1172 bps. At the same time, a data fusion algorithm based on fuzzy decision is designed for data processing on the acquisition nodes to reduce the amount of uploaded data, reduce power consumption and improve network throughput. Experiments show that the system has strong stability, flexible networking, low power consumption, long communication distance, and is suitable for wetland environmental monitoring.

Analysis and Enhancement of the LoRaWAN Adaptive Data Rate Scheme

The adaptive data rate (ADR) algorithm is a key component of the LoRaWAN protocol which controls the performance of a LoRaWAN Network. This modifies the data rate parameter of a device based on the current wireless conditions. In this article, we present substantive enhancements for the End Device and Network Server which reduce the convergence time for LoRaWAN devices to reach their optimal data rate. We extend the LoRaWAN module in ns-3 by adding ADR, enabling the simulation of realistic LoRaWAN networks, and add the implementation of the new enhancements in this module. The simulations show that these modifications can result in a significant reduction of the data rate convergence time for LoRaWAN devices and lead to an increased overall packet delivery rate for the network in a dynamic network environment. Our contributions are a publicly available implementation of ADR in ns-3, an analysis of the original algorithm behavior, and a novel version of the algorithm with enhancements that improve performance in every case while remaining easily integrable into an existing LoRaWAN system.