A Lightweight Multicast Authentication Mechanism for Small Scale IoT Applications

Security is very important for Internet of Things (IoTs). As a main communication mode, the security mechanism for multicast is not only the measure to ensure secured communications, but also the precondition for other security services. With the analysis of Nyberg´s fast one-way accumulator and its security, we discover that it has the property of absorbency in addition to the one-way and quasi-communicative property that makes it very suitable for applications in which accumulated items are dynamic. In this paper, we revise the original Nyberg´s fast one-way accumulator and construct a lightweight multicast authentication mechanism for small scale IoT applications. We analyze the security of the mechanism in detail. In addition, we evaluate seven performance aspects of the mechanism.