HardSecUAV: A hardware-based mutual authentication protocol for network of drones

Abstract

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) networks are increasingly utilized in various applications, yet they face significant security challenges due to their open operational environments and resource constraints. Existing authentication protocols often rely on stored secret keys, making them vulnerable to physical attacks and key compromise. To address this research gap, we propose HardSecUAV, a lightweight and secure authentication protocol that leverages hardware-based security features of the DS28S60 cryptographic coprocessor, including Physically Unclonable Functions (PUFs). Our protocol eliminates the need for secret key storage by generating device-specific secrets on-demand, enhancing resistance to physical attacks. Implementation results demonstrate that HardSecUAV achieves a total computation time of approximately 28.775 during the authentication phase, suitable for real-time operations. The storage requirement is 1024 bits, and the communication overhead is 1664 bits, comparable to existing schemes. Compared to existing protocols, HardSecUAV provides enhanced security features, including mutual authentication, replay attack resistance, forward secrecy, and UAV-to-UAV authentication without dependence on Ground Station(GS), making it a robust solution for securing UAV networks.