Project objectives

The goal of SEEDS is to accelerate the transfer and deployment of research knowledge between European countries and third-country (TC) partners in order to realize a cross layer design of reliable and robust security for V2X networks, and meet the challenging security requirements, that is identifiability, authentication, confidentiality and scalability.

Aims

Over the past few years, we have witnessed an increasing research interest and efforts in the development of connected and intelligent vehicles. There have been significant advancements in electronics aiding car drivers, along with vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communications to enable mobile Internet and entertainment. However, automotive and transportation engineers have a very limited understanding of the way in which security breaches may occur, and what the best practices are to enforce security requirements in future vehicular networks. The novelty of this project is to integrate pervasive vehicular connectivity, i.e., V2X, and new features of communications infrastructure and cryptography technologies, into the development of a cross-layer security for vehicular networks and, in particular, ensuring compliance of mission-critical requirements of vehicular applications.

 

Information found in this image is described below under measurable objectives

Measurable Objectives

  • Communication (link) level security

    Our first step is to develop a reliable and secured V2X communications architecture. Distinct from existing solutions, such as TDMA and OFDMA, which faces challenges to tackle a large fluctuation of channel quality and deteriorated performance, we focus on use of NOMA, mmWave and full duplexing (FD) based relaying to deliver V2X communications in a reliable and spectrally efficient way. Furthermore, the idea of physical layer security (PLS) can be naturally integrated with the proposed V2X structure to guarantee link level security by reducing the eavesdropping capability and improving the reception reliability at the legitimate vehicles.

  • Data level security

    Our second step is to devise data-centric security for vehicular networks. Data sharing is essential to vehicular applications. The concept of data-centric networks can be a suitable solution, however, with challenges in dealing with scalability and security using 3rd party storage for vehicle networks. Our focus here is to explore identity-based encryption and decentralized trust system for secure delivery of trustworthy data to vehicles. Such mechanisms will allow vehicles to effectively cooperate and securely distribute contents by leveraging collaborative caching at the edge and safeguard sensitive vehicle information.

  • Service level security

    We observe the parallels between the blockchain technology and the key features from two previous objectives. Having said this, the high degree of mobility and data exchange makes it particularly challenging to secure vehicular services. Our third step is to develop lightweight and scalable content dissemination protocols. Such methods lay a foundation not only for security and privacy in V2X networks but also for transport economy in developing a dynamic road-user charging model. The above three objectives are distinct in addressing different layer of challenges in vehicular networks, but they complement each other to achieve the overall goal of securing a unified vehicular communication network.

Work Packages

The SEEDS presents a multidisciplinary approach combining wireless communications, cyber security, mathematics and computing. In order to achieve the aforementioned objectives, the SEEDS will develop five areas of research in a bottom-up approach, organised into the following five Work packages (WP):