A key-chain based key management scheme for heterogeneous sensor network

Key management poses a main concern for security operation in wireless sensor networks. Most existing key management schemes try to establish shared keys for all pairs of neighbor sensors in homogeneous sensor networks. In recent, some research has demonstrated that heterogeneous sensor networks can achieve better performance in security than homogeneous networks. In this paper we propose a key- chain based key management scheme for heterogeneous sensor networks. The proposed scheme handles various events, such as pair-wise key establishment, cluster key distribution and renovation. Through the analysis of both security and performance, we show that the scheme reduces the node storage requirements, supports dynamic sensor networks, and also achieves better security than that of the existing sensor key management schemes.