Patent ID: 8254581
Filing Date: 2012-08-28
Classification: H04L,H04W

Abstract:
1. In a multiple-hop sensor network comprising a plurality of base stations and a plurality of sensor nodes, each base station and each sensor node comprising a public/private key pair, a certificate authority public key, and a default group key, a method to securely exchange data between a base station of the plurality of base stations and a sensor node of the plurality of sensor nodes, the method comprising: receiving, by the base station, a sensor node public key of the sensor node, the base station and the sensor node each comprising an application layer and a link layer; transmitting, by the base station, a base station public key to the sensor node, wherein the base station public key is authenticated using the default group key; distributing, by the base station, a session key and an ephemeral group key to the sensor node using the sensor node public key, the base station public key, and the certificate authority public key; and using the session key and the ephemeral group key to securely transmit and receive packets on the multiple-hop sensor network, wherein packets lacking the ephemeral group key are dropped at the link layer before any processing at the application layer commences and packets lacking the session key are dropped at the application layer.