MavSec: A safer version of MavLink

The MavLink protocol is a lightweight communication protocol used for communication between unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and the ground control station (GCS). The contents of the MavLink payload might include sensitive information, including mission details and the geographical coordinates of the drone. Nonetheless, due to the lack of encryption support in the MavLink protocol, the payload can be readily obtained and modified by an attacker. This study introduces an enhanced protocol called MavLink Secure (MavSec) that provides built-in support for payload encryption. Furthermore, we have also incorporated the secure key exchange process. Then, our proposed protocol was tested with various encryption algorithms (AES, RC4, ChaCha20, PRESENT, RECTANGLE) implemented in C++. Next, we proceed to evaluate the performance metrics with peak memory usage and average delay time on two separate machines. The results of experiments indicate that ChaCha20 has better overall performance in comparison to other encryption algorithms. The integration of ChaCha20 with MavSec has resulted in enhanced levels of confidentiality, integrity, and authenticity compared to the unprotected MavLink protocol.