Physical Layer Security in Future IoT Networks: Theories, Technologies, and Applications

Dear Colleagues,

In the upcoming sixth generation (6G) wireless networks, billions of smart-devices with sensing, computing, and communicating capabilities are expected to be involved in the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm in order to support future diverse communication demands, such as machine-to-machine (M2M), device-to-device (D2D), and device-to-everything (D2E) communications, IoT, and Internet of Vehicles (IoV). On the other hand, wireless communication has become an indispensable part of people’s daily life; everyone and everything heavily rely on the wireless transmission of important/private information, such as credit cards, verification codes, commercial secrets, and military orders. Therefore, wireless security is viewed as a critical issue for future 6G and beyond networks for both civilians and the military. Different from the traditional cryptographic techniques, physical layer security is identified as a promising strategy through smartly exploiting the randomness characteristics of physical wireless channels to either enlarge the difference between legitimate and wiretap channels using signal processing techniques or generate the physical layer keys by taking wireless channels as random sources.

The research of physical layer security in future IoT networks is still in its infancy and calls for more extensive and in-depth research efforts. Towards that end, this Special Issue aims to provide a venue to exchange recent advances of theories, technologies, and applications in this topic. We look forward to the latest research findings and high-quality works in the novel area of physical layer security in future IoT networks. The topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• IoT networks;
• Advanced signal processing of physical layer security;
• Measurements and models of secure communication scenarios;
• Stochastic secure network modeling;
• Resource allocation and management;
• Physical layer key generation;
• Interference modeling, design, and mitigation;
• Performance characterization and optimization design;
• Artificial Intelligence/Machine learning enabled channel estimation, transmission design and optimization;
• mmWave/TeraHertz communications;
• Reconfigurable intelligent surface;
• Multiple antenna technologies;
• Integrated sensing and communication in IoT networks;
• Physical layer security in UAV-based networks;
• Physical layer security in cooperative relay networks;
• Physical layer security in heterogeneous wireless network;
• Cognitive radio based secure communications;
• Physical layer security in satellite-terrestrial integrated networks;
• Non-orthogonal multiple access based physical layer security;
• Rate-splitting multiple access based physical layer security;
• Spectrum and energy efficient communications;
• Ultra-reliable and low-latency communications;
• Edge-computing based secure communications.

Dr. Zhi Lin
Prof. Dr. Xiaoyan Hu
Prof. Dr. Bin Li
Prof. Dr. Kang An
Guest Editors

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