A Distributed User Authentication Mechanism for IETF 6TiSCH Protocol

Internet of Things (IoT) has become a hot research topic recently. IoT networks are expected to integrate billions of small devices to the Internet enabling countless applications ranging from automation of cities to home based healthcare solutions for elderly and vulnerable population. Such wide range of application pose unique challenges such as the need for high reliability, ultra low power and low delay communications. In addition to these challenges, such Internet enabled small devices will have to be equipped with the necessary security suits to cope with security challenges posed by the Internet. Furthermore, these solutions have to address such unique challenges via a micro controller generally with a limited processing power and memory consuming as little energy as possible. This paper presents an extension to the secure bootstrapping mechanism of the newly introduced IETF 6TiSCH protocol where the authentication keys are distributed within the trusted nodes of the IoT network to enable an efficient authentication and bootstrapping process. Using a distributed approach, we aim to reduce the communication overhead of the standard IETF 6TiSCH authentication mechanism and improve energy efficiency of the network by keeping authentication tokens at the edge of the IoT network.