TinyRNG: A Cryptographic Random Number Generator for Wireless Sensors Network Nodes

Wireless sensors network (WSN) security is a major concern and many new protocols are being designed. Most of these protocols rely on cryptography, and therefore, require a cryptographic pseudo-random number generator (CPRNG). However, designing an efficient and secure CPRNG for wireless sensor networks is not trivial since most of the common source of randomness used by standard CPRNGs are not present on a wireless sensor node. We present TinyRNG, a CPRNG for wireless sensor nodes. Our generator uses the received bit errors as one of the sources of randomness. We show that transmission bit errors on a wireless sensor network are a very good source of randomness. We demonstrate that these errors are randomly distributed and uncorrelated from one sensor to another. Furthermore, we show that these errors are difficult to observe and manipulate by an attacker.