An Efficient Distributed Trust Model for Wireless Sensor Networks

TLDR

Trust models are increasingly used to secure wireless sensor networks, yet most rely only on communication behavior, which is inadequate against diverse malicious attacks. This study introduces an Efficient Distributed Trust Model (EDTM) for WSNs. EDTM selectively computes direct and recommendation trust based on packet counts, incorporates communication, energy, and data trust into direct trust, and refines recommendation trust with trust reliability and familiarity metrics. Simulations show that EDTM more accurately assesses node trustworthiness and outperforms existing models such as NBBTE.

Abstract

Trust models have been recently suggested as an effective security mechanism for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). Considerable research has been done on modeling trust. However, most current research work only takes communication behavior into account to calculate sensor nodes' trust value, which is not enough for trust evaluation due to the widespread malicious attacks. In this paper, we propose an Efficient Distributed Trust Model (EDTM) for WSNs. First, according to the number of packets received by sensor nodes, direct trust and recommendation trust are selectively calculated. Then, communication trust, energy trust and data trust are considered during the calculation of direct trust. Furthermore, trust reliability and familiarity are defined to improve the accuracy of recommendation trust. The proposed EDTM can evaluate trustworthiness of sensor nodes more precisely and prevent the security breaches more effectively. Simulation results show that EDTM outperforms other similar models, e.g., NBBTE trust model.