Securing wireless sensor networks: A survey of challenges and innovations

WSNs are a significant component of the modern technology systems. They find application in numerous sectors such as environmental monitoring, health care, agriculture and intelligent constructions. Although they possess low power, have low processing capacity and can readily be influenced by unsafe environments, they are still very important. They are therefore usually the victims of various forms of security threats as a result of that. The more advanced these threats become, the higher is the need to have strong and flexible security measures. The survey examines a broad spectrum of studies on the security of WSN. It encompasses numerous fields, such as how to transmit data safely, how to deal with keys, trust and reputation management systems and how to check and authenticate users. It also considers novel concepts such as applying blockchain and machine learning to identify security problems. Some of the studies in the research are based on straightforward solutions that can be applied effectively with the available limited resources of WSNs, whereas others attempt to achieve the balance between security and efficiency. Despite these developments, there are issues. The solutions are mostly energy consuming or are rigid to adapt to changing network conditions. The disconnect between the concepts in studies and their practical implementation is also present, in particular, the use of complex technologies, such as AI, in practice. This review aims to unite significant conclusions of the recent research, to emphasize the main issues that are not resolved yet, and to propose the useful directions in the further investigations. This survey provides an up-to-date and clear image of the current trends in WSN security, as it allows the researcher and developers to develop more efficient and profound strategies on how to make the system stronger and more reliable.