Helping secure robots in WSN environments by monitoring WSN software updates for intrusions

Robotics and Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) collaboration is an emerging research field in which both technologies can benefit from integrated implementations. A robot operating in WSN assisted environments can dynamically push instructions using over the air (OTA) update protocols to alter sensors to suit the requirements. In this paper, an Intrusion Detection System (IDS) for a WSN software update protocol is designed and simulated. When the protocol modifies the running software in a mote, the mote sends related information to the WSN sink. The IDS analyses the update phenomena of each of the motes in the network and computes an Intrusion Warning Score (IWS) that indicates a possible intrusion due to an illegitimate software update.