N-Accesses: A Blockchain-Based Access Control Framework for Secure IoT Data Management

Area of Science:

• Computer Science
• Information Security
• Network Engineering

Background:

• The Internet of Things (IoT) generates vast amounts of valuable data, but traditional access control methods struggle with security due to open environments and device limitations.
• Centralized access control in IoT faces single points of failure, while decentralized methods suffer from inefficient token use and insecure permission distribution.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a secure and efficient blockchain-based access control framework for Internet of Things (IoT) data management.
• To address the limitations of existing access control schemes, including token underutilization and insecure permission distribution.

Main Methods:

• A blockchain-based framework integrating smart contracts and hash-chains for user-defined, n-times access control with deadlines.
• Implementation of data hosting by owners and multi-use token capabilities within predefined limits.
• Leveraging blockchain's inherent features for data access auditing and verification.

Main Results:

• The proposed framework enables lightweight, user-defined data management for IoT data owners.
• The system improves token utilization by allowing multiple accesses within a deadline, enhancing efficiency.
• Blockchain's immutability ensures secure auditing and verification of data access records.

Conclusions:

• The developed blockchain-based access control framework effectively addresses the security and efficiency challenges in IoT data management.
• Extensive simulations confirm the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed solution for secure IoT data access.