TCP/IP and ICN Networking Technologies for the Internet of Things: A Comparative Study

Interconnecting resource-constrained devices in the Internet of Things (IoT) is generally achieved via IP-based technologies such as 6LoWPAN, which rely on the adaptation of the TCP/IP stack to fit IoT requirements. Very recent researches suggest that the Information-Centric Networking (ICN) paradigm, which switches the way to do networking, by fetching data by names regardless of their location, would provide native support for the functionalities required by IoT applications. Indeed, ICN intrinsic features, such as caching, naming, packet level security and stateful forwarding, favor it as a promising approach in the IoT. This paper gives a qualitative comparative study between the two communication paradigms (TCP/IP and ICN), and discusses their support for IoT environments, with a focus on the required key features such as mobility, scalability, and security.