Lightweight Cryptographic Framework for Trustworthy Data Exchange in Edge-Assisted IoT Networks

To address the latency and security challenges inherent in traditional cloud-based systems, this project introduces a Lightweight Cryptographic Framework designed for secure and efficient data exchange in edge-assisted IoT networks. The core of the system is an Edge-Based Blockchain Secure Data Sharing Scheme (EB-SDSS), which decentralizes data processing by enabling edge servers to interact directly with IoT devices. This significantly reduces data transfer delays and enhances performance compared to conventional cloud-centric models. The integration of blockchain technology ensures tamper-proof and transparent data storage through hash-based transaction records. This guarantees data integrity and trust in the system. To protect sensitive IoT data, AES symmetric encryption is employed for robust and lightweight encryption, while Locality-Sensitive Hashing (LSH) facilitates fast and efficient data retrieval across the blockchain. To eliminate the overhead of certificate management, a certificate-less signature scheme is implemented to authenticate IoT devices and verify data legitimacy. In addition, Shamir’s Secret Sharing method is utilized to protect cryptographic keys, enhancing the secure exchange and storage of sensitive information. As an extension, the project incorporates Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) to offer strong encryption with smaller key sizes, optimizing resource usage on constrained IoT devices. Furthermore, cache memory is leveraged to accelerate LSH operations, reducing the computational burden for repeated queries. By combining these cryptographic techniques and edge-computing principles, the framework enhances the security, efficiency, and responsiveness of IoT data sharing. It is especially suitable for sectors such as industrial automation, healthcare systems, and smart cities, where real-time data integrity and confidentiality are critical. This innovative approach lays the groundwork for scalable and trustworthy IoT ecosystems, supporting more agile and secure applications in next-generation smart environments.