A Comprehensive Survey on Cutting-Edge ECC and PUF Algorithm to Enhance Security in Internet of Drones

The Internet of Drones (IoD), an integration of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with Internet of Things (IoT) whose security concerns regarding authentication and data integrity, pose significant challenges. Authentication is pivotal in verifying the identity of drones. One powerful public key cryptography that is essential for maintaining secrecy and integrity is Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC). Its benefits, such as computational efficiency and lower key lengths, makes it a good choice for drones with limited resources. Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs), relying on unique physical characteristics, enhance hardware-based authentication, ensuring the integrity of both devices and data. These protocols also possess a few disadvantages which have been discussed in this article. To overcome these disadvantages we have introduced a hybrid approach. This article also talks about the Resource-Constrained IoT Authentication Protocol (RCIoTAP), an ECC-based protocol for secure communication. While demanding sophisticated hardware and software capabilities, It provides a secure and efficient authentication mechanism. While PAF-IoD, a PUF-based authentication framework used in IoD to secure communication and provide seamless authentication. The success of these authentication methods depends on careful consideration of application-specific requirements, hardware capabilities, and risk tolerance.