Key predistribution schemes for sensor networks for continuous deployment scenario

Abstract

In sensor networks, secure communication among sensor nodes requires secure links and consequently secure key establishment. Due to resource constraints, achieving such key establishment is non-trivial. Recently some random key predistribution techniques have been proposed to establish pairwise keys. Some of these approaches assume certain deployment knowledge is available prior to deployment and nodes are deployed in groups/bundles. In this paper, we propose another practical deployment model where nodes are deployed over a line one by one in a continuous fashion. In this model, sensor nodes can also be deployed over multiple parallel lines to cover two-dimensional area. Based on this model, we develop two key predistribution schemes. Analysis and simulation results show that our key predistribution schemes make use of the deployment knowledge better than the existing schemes. Thus they perform better than other location-aware protocols using the metrics of connectivity, re-siliency, memory usage and communication cost for key establishment.