Problems of the advanced encryption standard in protecting Internet of Things sensor networks

This paper deals with a new field for electronic measurements in very-poor signal-to-noise-ratio conditions, related to experimental analysis of transducer networks cybersecurity. The security vulnerability of the most used cryptographic algorithm in Internet of Things sensor networks, the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), is proved experimentally. To this aim, an improved version of state-of-the-art signature analysis of sensor power consumption (scatter attack) is exploited to discover the encryption key by a malicious smart soft micro-transducer. Attacking measurements are carried out by a commercial data acquisition micro-system, straightforward digital pre-processing, and suitable statistical analysis. An experimental case study, related to a successful attack to an 8-bit IoT microcontroller protected by AES-128 algorithm, is reported. The results highlight the need for the creation of an international standard of experimental characterization for IoT security