A simulation-based BB84-assisted Blockchain framework for secure key management in the Internet of Military Défense Things (IoMDT)

The rapid expansion of the Internet of Military Defense Things (IoMDT) requires a highly secure and reliable communication infrastructure to protect mission-critical information. Although conventional Blockchain technology provides data integrity, decentralization, and tamper resistance, its reliance on classical cryptographic mechanisms makes it vulnerable to future quantum computing attacks. To address this challenge, this study presents a simulation-based Blockchain framework integrating the BB84 Quantum Key Distribution(QKD) protocol for secure key management in IoMDT communication. The proposed framework is implemented using Python, IBM Qiskit, and the AerSimulator and is comparatively evaluated against a conventional Blockchain under the same computational environment. Performance is evaluated using standardized metrics such as block generation time, transaction delay, latency, memory and CPU usage, estimated energy consumption, and cryptographic entropy. The BB84 protocol is simulated with 8–24 qubits, and the Blockchain has an 8-qubit session key to process transactions securely. Its attained memory utilization is 0.01%, and CPU utilization is 82.6%. Experimental results indicate that the proposed framework achieves improved cryptographic key management and enhanced communication security with acceptable computational and resource overhead compared with the conventional Blockchain implementation. Although the integration of BB84 introduces additional processing during key generation, the results demonstrate that the proposed framework provides a practical simulation-based approach for strengthening secure communication in future IoMDT environments. The simulated environment limits the findings, necessitating a simulation environment and require validation on real quantum communication hardware for practical deployment.