Wireless Sensor Network Security: A Comprehensive Overview

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are shaping many activities in today's world such as surveillance and tracking. Due to their unattended nature and resource-constrained sensor nodes, however, WSNs are extremely vulnerable against any kind of internal or external security attacks. Considering these vulnerabilities and sensitivity of the data transmitted on WSNs, there is a tremendous need for security mechanisms. Moreover, because of the unique properties of WSNs, these security mechanisms must be developed during system design process. In this paper, we survey the "state-of-the-art" in WSN security, present the obstacles and requirements, and highlight the open research areas that need to be addressed.