Secure Real-Time Industrial IoT Communications in Smart Grids Using Named Data Networking

Abstract

This paper explores Named Data Networking (NDN) for secure Industrial IoT (IIoT) communications in smart grid applications. NDN is a next generation networking paradigm, which is data-centric and has the benefit of built-in security properties, such as data integrity. This work applies NDN to IEEE C37.118.2 PMU communications, as an example smart grid IIoT application, and proposes a new data-encapsulation approach for NDN for low latency data streaming. The proposed communication architecture allows sensor data streaming with a lower overhead compared to related work. Communications are demonstrated to be secured using a trust anchor which protects data integrity and provides data authentication, while supporting optional data encryption. The proposed solution represents IEEE C37.118.2 in a JSON format, which provides flexibility and facilitates application of the approach to different use cases.