Path-Key Establishment for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks are composed of large number of sensor nodes with limited communication and processing power. Key pre-distribution schemes using a shared large key pool have been proposed in order to overcome power and memory constraints. Establishing a secure link depends on the probability of sharing a key (secret) between two sensor nodes. In this paper, we propose a new approach for path key establishment. Our approach relies on electing trusted common nodes called ldquoproxiesrdquo that reside in an existing secure path linking the two sensor nodes. They will be used to send the generated key which will be divided into parts or nuggets according to the number of elected proxies. Our proposed approach is assessed against other algorithms. The results show that our algorithm discovers proxies faster with these proxies being located fewer hops away from both end nodes, resulting in shorter path length when compared to other existing algorithms. The results also show that our algorithm uses less transmission time than other algorithms, therefore adding efficiency by saving power.