A decentralized lightweight blockchain-based authentication mechanism for Internet of Vehicles

Blockchain technology can provide excellent support for identity authentication and access control mechanisms. In particular, blockchain technology can ensure that large amounts of confidential data generated by the Internet of Vehicles devices are stored and transmitted in a safe and reliable environment, which is the key to making system services optimal. In addition, mobile edge computing is the best solution for IoV applications to deal with low latency and limited computing and storage capacity of vehicle-mounted devices. Mobile edge computing can help IoV systems achieve a variety of functions and features, the most important of which is the ability to process terminal data in real-time. Even though the amount of data generated by IoV devices is growing rapidly, the system is still characterized by low latency and high efficiency. Because the communication between IoV devices is carried out in an untrusted environment, it is particularly important to design a secure and effective identity authentication scheme. Therefore, this paper proposes an efficient, safe, and time-sensitive authentication mechanism for devices on the Internet of Vehicles, which applies to a large number of scenarios. The mechanism is based on the blockchain concept and mobile edge computing technology. Security analysis shows that the proposed scheme meets the security requirements of the Internet of Vehicles and is resistant to many known attacks. By comparing with existing advanced IoT authentication schemes, the performance evaluation of the mechanism shows that the scheme enhances security features while reducing computation and communication overhead.