An efficient group key management protocol for Heterogeneous Sensor Networks

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are battery-powered ad hoc networks in which sensor nodes are scattered over a region. These nodes connect to each other and form multi-hop networks. These networks are used for various applications such as habitat monitoring, automation, and agriculture. These protocols must be designed to conserve the limited energy resources. In this paper, we discuss the heterogeneous sensor network (HSN) group key management issues. Taking consideration of the characteristics of HSN's, we propose an efficient group key management protocol for heterogeneous sensor networks. It mainly consists of four aspects-group key initialization, periodical update, adding new nodes and removing nodes. Moreover, we put forward a key graph construction algorithm based on routing energy consumption. The performance evaluation and security analysis indicate that the algorithm can effectively reduce the energy consumption of multicast. When the degree of key graph is equal to 4, the key graph is close to optimal.