Energy-efficient Adaptive Encryption for Wireless Visual Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks are usually composed of small sensor nodes with low processing power, limited memory and restricted energy supply. Among them, camera-enabled sensors can be used to gather visual data, but some relevant processing and transmission challenges are raised. In general, sensor networks have many vulnerabilities that can be exploited by attackers, demanding defense measures. However, traditional security mechanisms may impose high computing and communication overhead, which may compromise network performance specially when visual data is sensed from monitored fields. In this context, this paper proposes a new paradigm to ensure energy-efficient security for wireless visual sensor networks, defining an adaptive encryption approach. Doing so, confidentiality, authenticity and integrity are assured adaptively and according to application requirements, saving resources of networks while providing acceptable levels of protection for retrieved data.