Improving Connectivity and Resilience using ECC based Key Predistribution for deployment knowledge based WSN

Wireless Sensor Networks consist of small nodes with sensing, computation and communication capabilities, often deployed in remote inaccessible areas to interact with the environment and forward the measured event to the base station, thus posing several possibilities of physical attacks. Hence security becomes an important issue in wireless sensor networks. For resource constrained environments like wireless sensor networks key predistribution is found to be better choice. Another significant information regarding network is the deployment knowledge which can be used to improve the performance of the key predistribution schemes. Deployment knowledge offers numerous advantages when used in resource constrained environments, achieving better storage, better resilience to node capture, minimizing the number of keys and reduce network overhead. The main objective of this paper is to propose a novel scheme where keys are generated using Elliptic Curve Cryptography and predistributed into the nodes. Nodes are deployed in the area of interest considering hexagonal deployment knowledge and the links are formed based on the common keys of private key ring in each node. The performance of the system is evaluated in terms of resilience and connectivity. The results show that the connectivity and resilience of the network is better when compared to other existing key predistribution schemes. Key-Words: Security, Key Predistribution, Elliptic Curve Cryptography, Elliptic Curve Points, Connectivity, Resilience