The number of the Internet of Things (IoT) devices is growing at a rapid pace. Although the IoT has and continues to enable many new and exciting applications, recent studies show that cyberattacks on these Internet-connected low-powered devices are constantly increasing. One crucial security aspect for the IoT is device attestation, i.e., verifying the integrity of an IoT device’s firmware/software. Existing techniques for IoT device attestation are either vulnerable to physical attacks or rely on unrealistic assumptions in terms of hardware requirements. To solve these issues, this article presents Soteria, a novel quantum-powered remote attestation technique using quantum physical unclonable functions (QPUFs) which offer enhanced security by leveraging the unique properties of quantum mechanics. Soteria also exploits quantum superposition to attest multiple memory locations in parallel, and thus, protecting it from roving malware. A security analysis of Soteria shows that it is secure against various types of attacks, while a performance analysis shows that it achieves its desired security properties while maintaining low-computational complexity.
The number of the Internet of Things (IoT) devices is growing at a rapid pace. Although the IoT has and continues to enable many new and exciting applications, recent studies show that cyberattacks on these Internet-connected low-powered devices are constantly increasing. One crucial security aspect for the IoT is device attestation, i.e., verifying the integrity of an IoT device’s firmware/software. Existing techniques for IoT device attestation are either vulnerable to physical attacks or rely on unrealistic assumptions in terms of hardware requirements. To solve these issues, this article presents Soteria, a novel quantum-powered remote attestation technique using quantum physical unclonable functions (QPUFs) which offer enhanced security by leveraging the unique properties of quantum mechanics. Soteria also exploits quantum superposition to attest multiple memory locations in parallel, and thus, protecting it from roving malware. A security analysis of Soteria shows that it is secure against various types of attacks, while a performance analysis shows that it achieves its desired security properties while maintaining low-computational complexity.
The Internet of Things (IoT) has ushered in significant advancements in networked technologies, yet it simultaneously raises concerns about the security and privacy of connected devices. Traditional authentication methods based on cryptographic protocols are increasingly vulnerable to attacks as the number of devices grows and attackers develop more sophisticated strategies. In this paper, we propose a novel quantum-based authentication method using Quantum Physical Unclonable Functions (QPUFs) to address the security challenges in IoT devices. Quantum PUFs exploit the inherent quantum properties of devices to generate unique, unclonable responses to challenges, providing a high level of security and resilience against attacks such as cloning, spoofing, and interception. We present the architecture of the proposed quantum authentication system, discuss the challenge-response protocol, and evaluate the system’s performance. Experimental results show that this approach offers strong security guarantees with minimal computational overhead. We Evaluate the Security, Scalability of our approach in simulated adverse IoT environment.
Internet of Things (IoT) peripheral devices typically operate in resource-constrained environments and platform enclosures. This poses challenges when attempting to secure data traffic between operators and field devices. Due to the resource-intensive nature and/or stringent (e.g., connectivity) requirements of current encryption techniques, many prove infeasible to use within an IoT Edge network. In this work, we have developed a hardware-based attestation and authentication solution for IoT devices operating within constrained Edge environments where compute resource can be scarce, connectivity intermittent, environmental conditions uncontrolled, and accessibility limited. This is achieved through the use of an array of Resonant Tunneling Diodes (RTDs) that facilitate the generation of a ’strong’ Physical Unclonable Function (PUF) from a limited number of RTDs, reducing the device footprint and resource requirements. Comprehensive statistical analysis of the response of the array to external excitation has shown that the proposed RTD-based PUF can produce a suitably random, yet repeatable, and most importantly unclonable response to a given challenge. Thus, demonstrating the validity of the proposed solution for use within key generation or device authentication of assets within the IoT network.
The Internet of Things (IoT) has grown rapidly, transforming various aspects of daily life into intelligent systems capable of collecting and exchanging data in real time. At the same time, advances in quantum computing have given rise to powerful quantum computers capable of processing complex tasks at unprecedented speed. This disparity between the limited resources of IoT devices and the capabilities of quantum computers poses significant security challenges. Quantum computers introduce new vulnerabilities that threaten IoT systems, particularly in critical applications such as connected healthcare, industrial networks, smart infrastructure, and secure embedded systems. This study reviews the existing literature on post-quantum cryptography (PQC) applied to IoT devices. It analyzes the characteristics and security requirements of IoT environments, current security technologies, and unresolved issues. It highlights the growing threat of post-quantum attacks and the need to adapt security strategies. Finally, the study explores post-quantum code-based cryptosystems as solutions to enhance the security of resource-constrained IoT applications and ensure their resilience against future challenges.
This research investigates the integration of quantum hardware-assisted security into critical applications, including the Industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT), Smart Grid, and Smart Transportation. The Quantum Physical Unclonable Functions (QPUF) architecture has emerged as a robust security paradigm, harnessing the inherent randomness of quantum hardware to generate unique and tamper-resistant cryptographic fingerprints. This work explores the potential of Quantum Computing for Security-by-Design (SbD) in the Industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT), aiming to establish security as a fundamental and inherent feature. SbD in Quantum Computing focuses on ensuring the security and privacy of Quantum computing applications by leveraging the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, which underpin the quantum computing infrastructure. This research presents a scalable and sustainable security framework for the trusted attestation of smart industrial entities in Quantum Industrial Internet-of-Things (QIoT) applications within Industry 4.0. Central to this approach is the QPUF, which leverages quantum mechanical principles to generate unique, tamper-resistant fingerprints. The proposed QPUF circuit logic has been deployed on IBM quantum systems and simulators for validation. The experimental results demonstrate the enhanced randomness and an intra-hamming distance of approximately 50% on the IBM quantum hardware, along with improved reliability despite varying error rates, coherence, and decoherence times. Furthermore, the circuit achieved 100% reliability on Google’s Cirq simulator and 95% reliability on IBM’s quantum simulator, highlighting the QPUF’s potential in advancing quantum-centric security solutions.
The rapid advancement of quantum computing has introduced a critical need for secure quantum device attestation to ensure that devices involved in computations are authentic.Existing solutions for quantum device attestation often rely on quantum memory or lack adaptability across diverse quantum computing platforms. To address these limitations, we propose a novel Quantum Physical Unclonable Function (QPUF)-based device attestation scheme that leverages the inherent noise of Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ). Unlike existing methods, our approach eliminates the need for quantum memory and is compatible with various quantum hardware technologies.The proposed method uses a custom quantum circuit as a QPUF, combined with a challenge-response-based protocol, to establish secure and efficient quantum device attestation. We evaluated our approach on IBM quantum hardware, analyzing key metrics such as instability, randomness, and uniqueness of the QPUFs. Experimental results validate the feasibility of the proposed method and demonstrate its practical advantages for real-world quantum service provision.
The Internet of Things (IoT) plays a significant role in shaping different aspects of our lives. IoT devices have become increasingly important due to their ability to connect, collect, and analyze data, automate processes, improve safety and efficiency, and deliver personalized experiences. However, the advancement in quantum computer development poses a significant threat to resource-constrained IoT devices. This new generation of computers can break the classic public-key cryptographic schemes and digital signatures implemented in these IoT devices. While protecting IoT devices from quantum computer attacks poses many challenges, researchers are continuously making significant progress in developing lightweight post-quantum cryptographic algorithms for efficient key exchange mechanisms and digital signature algorithms tailored to IoT devices to overcome this issue. This paper proposes Q-SECURE, a post-Quantum resistant Security Enhancing Cryptography for Unified Resource-constrained device Encryption. A novel scheme that enables any IoT system to leverage the assistance of other devices in the network to gain the capability to generate any proposed post-quantum cryptographic key of a given size using distributed and parallel computing.