Contributions to Securing Software Updates in IoT

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a large network of connected devices. In IoT, devices can communicate with each other or back-end systems to transfer data or perform assigned tasks. Communication protocols used in IoT depend on target applications but usually require low bandwidth. On the other hand, IoT devices are constrained, having limited resources, including memory, power, and computational resources. Considering these limitations in IoT environments, it is difficult to implement best security practices. Consequently, network attacks can threaten devices or the data they transfer. Thus it is crucial to react quickly to emerging vulnerabilities. These vulnerabilities should be mitigated by firmware updates or other necessary updates securely. Since IoT devices usually connect to the network wirelessly, such updates can be performed Over-The-Air (OTA). This dissertation presents contributions to enable secure OTA software updates in IoT. In order to perform secure updates, vulnerabilities must first be identified and assessed. In this dissertation, first, we present our contribution to designing a maturity model for vulnerability handling. Next, we analyze and compare common communication protocols and security practices regarding energy consumption. Finally, we describe our designed lightweight protocol for OTA updates targeting constrained IoT devices. IoT devices and back-end systems often use incompatible protocols that are unable to interoperate securely. This dissertation also includes our contribution to designing a secure protocol translator for IoT. This translation is performed inside a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) with TLS interception. This dissertation also contains our contribution to key management and key distribution in IoT networks. In performing secure software updates, the IoT devices can be grouped since the updates target a large number of devices. Thus, prior to deploying updates, a group key needs to be established among group members. In this dissertation, we present our designed secure group key establishment scheme. Symmetric key cryptography can help to save IoT device resources at the cost of increased key management complexity. This trade-off can be improved by integrating IoT networks with cloud computing and Software Defined Networking (SDN).In this dissertation, we use SDN in cloud networks to provision symmetric keys efficiently and securely. These pieces together help software developers and maintainers identify vulnerabilities, provision secret keys, and perform lightweight secure OTA updates. Furthermore, they help devices and systems with incompatible protocols to be able to interoperate

Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

Guiding readers through the basics of these rapidly emerging networks to more advanced concepts and future expectations, Mobile Ad hoc Networks: Current Status and Future Trends identifies and examines the most pressing research issues in Mobile Ad hoc Networks (MANETs). Containing the contributions of leading researchers, industry professionals, and academics, this forward-looking reference provides an authoritative perspective of the state of the art in MANETs. The book includes surveys of recent publications that investigate key areas of interest such as limited resources and the mobility of mobile nodes. It considers routing, multicast, energy, security, channel assignment, and ensuring quality of service. Also suitable as a text for graduate students, the book is organized into three sections: Fundamentals of MANET Modeling and Simulation—Describes how MANETs operate and perform through simulations and models Communication Protocols of MANETs—Presents cutting-edge research on key issues, including MAC layer issues and routing in high mobility Future Networks Inspired By MANETs—Tackles open research issues and emerging trends Illustrating the role MANETs are likely to play in future networks, this book supplies the foundation and insight you will need to make your own contributions to the field. It includes coverage of routing protocols, modeling and simulations tools, intelligent optimization techniques to multicriteria routing, security issues in FHAMIPv6, connecting moving smart objects to the Internet, underwater sensor networks, wireless mesh network architecture and protocols, adaptive routing provision using Bayesian inference, and adaptive flow control in transport layer using genetic algorithms

Radio Communications

In the last decades the restless evolution of information and communication technologies (ICT) brought to a deep transformation of our habits. The growth of the Internet and the advances in hardware and software implementations modified our way to communicate and to share information. In this book, an overview of the major issues faced today by researchers in the field of radio communications is given through 35 high quality chapters written by specialists working in universities and research centers all over the world. Various aspects will be deeply discussed: channel modeling, beamforming, multiple antennas, cooperative networks, opportunistic scheduling, advanced admission control, handover management, systems performance assessment, routing issues in mobility conditions, localization, web security. Advanced techniques for the radio resource management will be discussed both in single and multiple radio technologies; either in infrastructure, mesh or ad hoc networks

Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks

Being infrastructure-less and without central administration control, wireless ad-hoc networking is playing a more and more important role in extending the coverage of traditional wireless infrastructure (cellular networks, wireless LAN, etc). This book includes state-of the-art techniques and solutions for wireless ad-hoc networks. It focuses on the following topics in ad-hoc networks: vehicular ad-hoc networks, security and caching, TCP in ad-hoc networks and emerging applications. It is targeted to provide network engineers and researchers with design guidelines for large scale wireless ad hoc networks

Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Models and Technologies for Intelligent Transportation Systems 2013

Challenges arising from an increasing traffic demand, limited resource availability and growing quality expectations of the customers can only be met successfully, if each transport mode is regarded as an intelligent transportation system itself, but also as part of one intelligent transportation system with “intelligent” intramodal and intermodal interfaces. This topic is well reflected in the Third International Conference on “Models and Technologies for Intelligent Transportation Systems” which took place in Dresden 2013 (previous editions: Rome 2009, Leuven 2011). With its variety of traffic management problems that can be solved using similar methods and technologies, but with application specific models, objective functions and constraints the conference stands for an intensive exchange between theory and practice and the presentation of case studies for all transport modes and gives a discussion forum for control engineers, computer scientists, mathematicians and other researchers and practitioners. The present book comprises fifty short papers accepted for presentation at the Third Edition of the conference. All submissions have undergone intensive reviews by the organisers of the special sessions, the members of the scientific and technical advisory committees and further external experts in the field. Like the conference itself the proceedings are structured in twelve streams: the more model-oriented streams of Road-Bound Public Transport Management, Modelling and Control of Urban Traffic Flow, Railway Traffic Management in four different sessions, Air Traffic Management, Water Traffic and Traffic and Transit Assignment, as well as the technology-oriented streams of Floating Car Data, Localisation Technologies for Intelligent Transportation Systems and Image Processing in Transportation. With this broad range of topics this book will be of interest to a number of groups: ITS experts in research and industry, students of transport and control engineering, operations research and computer science. The case studies will also be of interest for transport operators and members of traffic administration

Applications

Volume 3 describes how resource-aware machine learning methods and techniques are used to successfully solve real-world problems. The book provides numerous specific application examples: in health and medicine for risk modelling, diagnosis, and treatment selection for diseases in electronics, steel production and milling for quality control during manufacturing processes in traffic, logistics for smart cities and for mobile communications