UAV Secure Communication for IoT Applications

Dear Colleagues,

The Internet of Things (IoT) stands at the forefront of technological progress, poised to become the backbone of future 6G networks. The IoT has the potential to enable ubiquitous connectivity and intelligence, thus orchestrating a harmonious and efficient future society. As billions of IoT devices interweave various applications, there is an expectation of massive data to be collected, transmitted, and further interpreted. In this respect, IoT data communication security is fundamental and thus of paramount importance. However, the evident vulnerability of IoT devices and networks exposes them to various security threats that jeopardize information secrecy, service continuity, personal privacy, and even infrastructure operations.

In this landscape, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) present a transformative dimension in effective IoT data acquisition and dissemination. With unparalleled mobility and accessibility, UAVs traverse diverse landscapes, reaching remote areas and offering geographic advantages for attack detection and mitigation. The synergy between UAVs and IoT also provides new opportunities for security provisioning. As UAVs can conveniently approach the vicinity of IoT nodes, the geographic advantages can be effectively exploited for attack detection and mitigation, enabling resource-efficient security design. Particularly, with UAV-facilitated IoT communication, the channel advantage can be reconstructed and enhanced at the physical layer towards improved secrecy. Moreover, the broader security paradigms can also be extended with UAVs to guarantee data integrity and privacy through schemes such as the joint design of UAVs and blockchains. Therefore, by integrating UAVs into the security infrastructure, we transcend the limitations of traditional approaches, embracing a proactive and adaptive framework and strategies towards security-enhanced IoT communications.

This Special Issue aims to advance discussions on UAV-facilitated secure IoT communications. We invite submissions exploring multifaceted security concerns, and encompassing authentication, secrecy, privacy, and trust. Serving as a platform to unravel the interplay between UAVs, sensors, and evolving security paradigms, this Special Issue steers the discourse towards a future with secure and resilient IoT systems. We encourage submissions from researchers and practitioners on a wide range of topics, including but not limited to the following:

• UAV-facilitated physical layer security for IoT communications;
• UAV-facilitated anti-jamming communications for IoT;
• UAV-facilitated blockchain system design for IoT;
• Interference management in UAV-facilitated IoT communications;
• Cross-layer security optimization in UAV-facilitated IoT communications;
• Security protocols for UAV-facilitated IoT communications;
• Machine learning in UAV-facilitated secure IoT communications;
• Techno-economic analysis of UAV-facilitated secure IoT communications;
• Prototype and testbed implementation for UAV-facilitated secure IoT communications.

Dr. Xiao Tang
Dr. Wei Liang
Guest Editors

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• UAV
• IoT communications
• security protocols