Corona Graph-Based Encryption for Secure IoT Communication

The rapid expansion of IoT in domains like smart homes and wearables has intensified the need for lightweight and secure encryption . In this work, we propose a novel Corona Graph-Based Encryption scheme tailored for resource-constrained IoT environments. Our method constructs a corona graph, labels each node with pseudorandom values (from a PRNG seeded by a shared key), and performs encryption by XOR-ing plaintext blocks with the sequence of node labels obtained along a predefined traversal path. Decryption inverts this process using the same PRNG and graph path. We benchmark the scheme against AES-128 and ChaCha20, evaluating CPU usage, memory footprint, throughput, and output entropy. Simulated results indicate that while Corona Graph encryption incurs higher CPU overhead (due to graph traversal), it achieves comparable ciphertext entropy, suggesting strong security properties. We discuss use cases in smart homes, drones, and wearables, and argue that Corona-Graph encryption offers a flexible, structurally-rich alternative for IoT data protection.