A Study of IEEE 802.15.6 Association Protocols

A body area network is a network of small and portable devices around human bodies. It enables a number of interesting applications including elderly healthcare and chronic diseases monitoring. Since body area networks are used to collect sensitive information, they require proper security protections. IEEE Std 802.15.6 is a standard for body area networks, it also provides mechanisms for strong security. In this paper, security association protocols proposed in the standard are reviewed. First of all, several security flaws are found. In addition, we also get some interesting findings from the standpoint of performance and usability.