Implementation of Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm on an IRIS mote using SHA-512

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) are spatially distributed nodes monitoring physical or environmental conditions such as temperature, pressure, sound, light etc using sensors. The sensed data is cooperatively passed through a series of nodes in a network to a main base-station (BS) where it is analysed by the user. The data is communicated over a wireless channel between the nodes and since wireless channel has minimum security, the data has to communicated in a secure manner. Different encryption techniques can be applied to transmit the data securely. This work provides an efficient implementation of Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) using SHA-512 algorithm on an IRIS mote. The ECDSA does not actually encrypt the data but provides a means to check the integrity of the received data. If the received data has been modified by an attacker, the ECDSA detects it and signals to the transmitter for retransmission. The SHA-512 algorithm is the hash algorithm used in the ECDSA and is implemented for an 8-bit architecture. The SHA-512 algorithm is chosen as it provides better security than its predecessors.