Energy efficiency of symmetric key cryptographic algorithms in wireless sensor networks

In this paper, we examine the energy efficiency of symmetric key cryptographic algorithms applied in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and in our study we consider both stream ciphers and block ciphers. We derive the computational energy cost of the ciphers under consideration by comparing the number of CPU cycles required to perform encryption. After evaluating a number of symmetric key ciphers, we compare the energy performance of stream ciphers and block ciphers applied to a noisy channel in a WSN. In conclusion, we recommend using a lightweight block cipher referred to as byte-oriented substitution-permutation network (BSPN), to achieve energy efficiency with a level of security suitable for wireless sensor networks.