IoT Security

14Blockchain‐Based Cyber Physical Trust Systems

Arnold Beckmann Alex Milne Jean‐Jose Razafindrakoto Pardeep Kumar Michael Breach and Norbert Preining

Abstract

Cyber Physical Trust Systems (CPTS) are Cyber Physical Systems and Internet of Things (IoT) enriched with trust as an explicit, measurable, testable system component. In this chapter, we propose to use blockchain technology as the trust‐enabling system component for CPTS. Our proposed approach shows that a blockchain‐based CPTS achieves the security properties of data authenticity, identity, and integrity. We describe results of a testbed which implements a blockchain‐based CPTS for physical asset management.

Keywords: cyber physical systems; internet of things; data authenticity; identity; integrity; asset management

14.1 Introduction

Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) integrate computation, networking, and physical processes [1]. As CPS and Internet of Things (IoT) are overlap quite a bit, the distinction to IoT is blurred, with CPS serving as IoT devices, and IoT devices being components of CPS. Advances enabled by CPS are vast, including electric power generation and delivery, personalized healthcare, traffic flow management, and emergency response, as well as in many other areas just now being envisioned. As shown in Figure 14.1, many millions of connected CPS devices will be communicating over the public network and will provide services to their respective applications.

Figure 14.1 Connected cyber physical system.

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