6th International ICST Conference on Communications and Networking in China

Research Article

Energy Cost of Cryptographic Session Key Establishment in a Wireless Sensor Network

  • @INPROCEEDINGS{10.1109/ChinaCom.2011.6158174,
        author={Cheng Li and Xueying Zhang and Howard Heys},
        title={Energy Cost of Cryptographic Session Key Establishment in a Wireless Sensor Network},
        proceedings={6th International ICST Conference on Communications and Networking in China},
        publisher={IEEE},
        proceedings_a={CHINACOM},
        year={2012},
        month={3},
        keywords={wireless sensor networks security encryption key establishment},
        doi={10.1109/ChinaCom.2011.6158174}
    }
    
  • Cheng Li
    Xueying Zhang
    Howard Heys
    Year: 2012
    Energy Cost of Cryptographic Session Key Establishment in a Wireless Sensor Network
    CHINACOM
    IEEE
    DOI: 10.1109/ChinaCom.2011.6158174
Cheng Li1,*, Xueying Zhang1, Howard Heys1
  • 1: Memorial University
*Contact email: licheng.mun@gmail.com

Abstract

This paper presents an energy cost analysis for session key establishment in a wireless sensor network (WSN). A session key is used to encrypt the data between two nodes and it should be established before the start of their secure data communication. In a WSN, the session key establishment is an important process in constructing a secure data communication and is preferably undertaken to minimize the energy drain on the energy-constrained sensor node. In our study, we examine the energy cost of session key establishment using a symmetric-key based protocol in a WSN. We make use of an energy consumption model for the sensor node that considers the communication cost and computational cost for implementing the protocol on a microcontroller-based sensor node. In particular, we explore the effects of session key establishment to the overall energy cost in a sensor node, especially considering the frequency of key establishment and the quality of communication channel.