An Ultra-Lightweight Secure RFID Authentication Protocol for Low-Cost Tags

Radio-Frequency Identification Technology (RFID) is a non-contact identification technology based on radio waves. It is mainly comprised of an RFID reader and RFID tags where RFID tags store unique information while an RFID reader emits radio waves to interrogate the tag. RFID technology doesn't require a line of sight, so it can identify objects from a larger distance, and it has numerous applications in different areas like IoT (Internet of Things), IoV (Internet of Vehicles), etc. RFID technology relies on wireless communication for data transmission, so it is more prone to security attacks, and if security is compromised, then it may lead to disastrous results. To maintain security in RFID systems, there is a need to use some lightweight authentication protocols, as RFID tags have limited memory and less computation capabilities. This paper reviewed the three RFID-based lightweight authentication protocols, i.e. LRSAS + , LRARP, and LRARP + . Also, we have done the cryptanalysis of these lightweight protocols and found that they are unsuitable for low-cost tags due to their high computation power. So, keeping the focus on low-cost tags, we have proposed an ultra-lightweight RFID authentication protocol known as ULRARP + protocol that solely relies on ultra-lightweight operations like XOR, Perm and Rotation operations. Informal security evaluation indicates that the proposed protocol resists different security attacks. Also, a formal evaluation of the proposed protocol is done using GNY logic. Further, performance evaluation of the ULRARP + protocol is computed based on three parameters, i.e. Tag's computational cost, Storage space, and the message transmitted by the tag. Results indicate that our proposed ultra-lightweight protocol is more secure and performance-efficient than the existing state-of-the-art authentication protocols.