Survey of Lightweight Hardware-Based Hash Functions for Security in Constrained IoT Devices

Lightweight cryptographic primitives are commonly used to secure communication in resource-constrained IoT devices such as RFID tags, sensors, actuators, wireless sensor networks, and edge gateways. This paper surveys a selection of key hardware-based lightweight hash functions, classified according to their architectural construction and compared using hardware-specific performance metrics, including gate equivalency, throughput, and figure of merit. We map each hash function to a distinct IoT device category based on a novel correlation between throughput and gate equivalency and use this to assess their suitability for the specific resource-constrained applications. The security properties of the lightweight hash functions are systematically evaluated based on preimage resistance, second preimage resistance, and collision resistance, complemented by regression analysis and a comprehensive review of published cryptanalytic attacks and known vulnerabilities. We highlight structural weaknesses in commonly used lightweight hash-function construction approaches and expose key trade-offs between hardware performance, cost, and cryptographic strength.