Collaborative Computations to Enable Security in the Battery-less Internet of Things

Backscatter communication is a key enabler for the battery-less Internet of Things (IoT) to seamlessly embed devices and sensors into the surrounding environment.

Backscatter systems delegate the power-intensive generation of the radio frequency carrier to an external emitter device, which enables an ultra-low power tag to modulate the data by simply reflecting the carrier signal.

The small amount of energy needed by the tag to communicate can be harvested from the environment.Ensuring the security of sensitive data is paramount in the battery-less IoT, but it introduces computational overhead that contradicts the goal of reducing complexity on the tags.

This project aims to address this issue by rethinking the relation between communication and security related computation.

More specifically, we build on the observation that backscatter tags rely on other devices to communicate, and systematically identify and evaluate how backscatter communication mechanisms through contributions from other devices also reduce the computational complexity on the low-power tags. The research takes a systems approach that combines theoretical foundations and practical implementations.

We build on results and observations from previous work in backscatter communication and wireless security.

If successful, our project will enable secure battery-free sensors and thus fundamentally change the design space for IoT applications.