Security of Industrial Wireless Sensor Networks: A review

Industrial wireless sensor networks have attracted widespread attention recently. This is attributable to their inherent advantage over the traditional wired systems mainly in terms of ease in scaling and redeployment of the network. Wireless sensor networks can also be deployed in remote and hard to reach locations. However security is always a concern when wireless devices are involved. Relatively easier eavesdropping when compared to a wired system can make the communication network vulnerable to security attacks. Thus the security of Industrial Wireless Sensor Networks (IWSNs) is vital. An overview of the major requirements and security issues related to IWSNs are presented in this article. We focus on cryptographic and chaos based algorithms that can be considered as possible solutions in sensor networks.