Advanced IoT Security Solutions for Healthcare and Critical Infrastructures

A special issue of Electronics (ISSN 2079-9292). This special issue belongs to the section "Computer Science & Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 September 2025 | Viewed by 4316

Special Issue Editors


E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Canadian Institute for Cybersecurity (CIC), Faculty of Computer Science, University of New Brunswick (UNB), Fredericton, NB, Canada
Interests: multimedia watermarking and security; cybersecurity; IoT security; security in machine learning techniques
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Finance, Information Systems & Management Science at the Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary's University, Halifax, NS B3H 3C3, Canada
Interests: data mining in cybersecurity; big data analytics
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Arts and Science, MacEwan University, Edmonton, AB T5J 4S2, Canada
Interests: cybersecurity; blockchain; network security; privacy-preserving; Industrial IoT (IIoT) security

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Research Associate, National Research Council (NRC); Fredericton, NB E3B 9W4, Canada
Interests: artificial intelligence; cybersecurity; IoT

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The rapid proliferation of Internet of Things (IoT) devices in sectors such as healthcare and critical infrastructures present significant security challenges. These devices, while enhancing operational efficiency and service delivery, also introduce vulnerabilities that can be exploited by malicious actors. This Special Issue, "Advanced IoT Security Solutions for Healthcare and Critical Infrastructures," aims to address these pressing concerns through gathering pioneering research and innovative solutions. We invite original contributions that delve into various aspects of IoT security, focusing on the unique requirements and challenges faced in healthcare and critical infrastructure environments. Topics of interest include securing IoT devices against cyber threats, implementing robust network security strategies, ensuring data privacy and protection, and leveraging AI and machine learning to enhance IoT security measures. Additionally, we seek case studies and real-world applications that demonstrate the efficacy of advanced security solutions in protecting IoT ecosystems in these vital sectors. By bringing together interdisciplinary expertise and cutting-edge research, this Special Issue aims to advance the state of the art in IoT security, fostering the development of robust, scalable, and effective solutions to safeguard our most critical systems.

The proposed topic aims to attract high-quality research papers that address various aspects, including the following:

  1. IoT Device Security: Methods for securing individual IoT devices against cyber threats.
  2. Network Security: Strategies for protecting IoT networks, including intrusion detection and prevention systems.
  3. Data Privacy and Protection: Techniques for ensuring data privacy and protection in IoT ecosystems.
  4. AI and Machine Learning for IoT Security: Leveraging AI and ML to enhance IoT security measures.
  5. Security in IoMT (Internet of Medical Things): Addressing specific security concerns in the healthcare sector, particularly for medical devices.
  6. Case Studies and Real-World Applications: Practical implementations and case studies demonstrating advanced IoT security solutions in healthcare and other critical sectors.

This focus will not only highlight cutting-edge research, but will also encourage interdisciplinary collaboration among experts in cybersecurity, healthcare, and critical infrastructure protection.

Dr. Sajjad Dadkhah
Dr. Xichen Zhang
Dr. Mahdi Daghmehchi Firoozjaei
Dr. Euclides Neto
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Electronics is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • IoT security
  • healthcare IoT
  • Internet of Medical Things (IoMT)
  • critical infrastructure security
  • network security
  • data privacy and protection
  • AI and machine learning for IoT security
  • intrusion detection and prevention
  • cybersecurity in healthcare
  • real-world IoT security applications

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (3 papers)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

20 pages, 1502 KiB  
Article
Power Profiling of Smart Grid Users Using Dynamic Time Warping
by Minchang Kim, Mahdi Daghmehchi Firoozjaei, Hyoungshick Kim and Mohamad El-Hajj
Electronics 2025, 14(10), 2015; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics14102015 - 15 May 2025
Viewed by 140
Abstract
Power consumption data play a crucial role in demand management and abnormality detection in smart grids. Despite its management benefits, analyzing power consumption data leads to profiling consumers and opens privacy issues. To demonstrate this, we present a power profiling model for smart [...] Read more.
Power consumption data play a crucial role in demand management and abnormality detection in smart grids. Despite its management benefits, analyzing power consumption data leads to profiling consumers and opens privacy issues. To demonstrate this, we present a power profiling model for smart grid consumers based on real-time load data acquired from smart meters. It profiles consumers’ power consumption behavior by applying the daily load factor and the dynamic time warping (DTW) clustering algorithm. Due to the invariability of signal warping of this algorithm, time-disordered load data can be profiled and consumption features can be extracted. By this model, two load types are defined and the related load patterns are extracted for classifying consumption behavior by DTW. The classification methodology is discussed in detail. To evaluate the performance of the proposed model for profiling, we analyze the time-series load data measured by a smart meter in a real case. The results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed profiling method, achieving an F-score of 0.8372 for load type clustering in the best case and an overall accuracy of 77.17% for power profiling. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

18 pages, 1282 KiB  
Article
A Modeling-Based Approach for Performance and Availability Assessment of IoMT Systems
by Thiago Valentim Bezerra, Gustavo Callou, Francisco Airton and Eduardo Tavares
Electronics 2025, 14(6), 1157; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics14061157 - 15 Mar 2025
Viewed by 423
Abstract
The Internet of Things (IoT) enables remote monitoring of various environmental components through existing network infrastructures, thereby facilitating the integration of diverse computing systems. IoT systems encompass a wide range of devices and communication protocols, offering flexibility across various application domains. This adaptability [...] Read more.
The Internet of Things (IoT) enables remote monitoring of various environmental components through existing network infrastructures, thereby facilitating the integration of diverse computing systems. IoT systems encompass a wide range of devices and communication protocols, offering flexibility across various application domains. This adaptability makes IoT solutions particularly suitable for healthcare applications. For example, hospitals have implemented the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) to collect and transmit patient data to healthcare professionals, as continuous monitoring is critical for patients in intensive care. Healthcare systems often demand high availability and have stringent performance requirements due to the necessity for rapid medical decision-making. However, the simultaneous assessment of performance and availability in IoMT systems is often overlooked. This paper introduces a modeling approach using stochastic Petri nets (SPNs) to evaluate both the availability and performance of IoMT systems. The approach also takes into account redundancy techniques, which may significantly improve system availability. The results highlight the practical feasibility of the proposed approach, demonstrating a reduction in downtime from 46.36 h to 0.21 h, while the response time remained constant. This indicates that the proposed modeling approach can enhance system availability without compromising performance. In addition, the proposed models adopt data collected from a real environment designed to support this approach. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis was performed to identify the components that have a significant impact on system operation. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

34 pages, 85423 KiB  
Article
Lightweight, Post-Quantum Secure Cryptography Based on Ascon: Hardware Implementation in Automotive Applications
by Hai Phong Nguyen and Yuhua Chen
Electronics 2024, 13(22), 4550; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13224550 - 19 Nov 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3062
Abstract
With the rapid growth of connected vehicles and the vulnerability of embedded systems against cyber attacks in an era where quantum computers are becoming a reality, post-quantum cryptography (PQC) is a crucial solution. Yet, by nature, automotive sensors are limited in power, processing [...] Read more.
With the rapid growth of connected vehicles and the vulnerability of embedded systems against cyber attacks in an era where quantum computers are becoming a reality, post-quantum cryptography (PQC) is a crucial solution. Yet, by nature, automotive sensors are limited in power, processing capability, memory in implementing secure measures. This study presents a pioneering approach to securing automotive systems against post-quantum threats by integrating the Ascon cipher suite—a lightweight cryptographic protocol—into embedded automotive environments. By combining Ascon with the Controller Area Network (CAN) protocol on an Artix-7 Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), we achieve low power consumption while ensuring high performance in post-quantum-resistant cryptographic tasks. The Ascon module is designed to optimize computational efficiency through bitwise Boolean operations and logic gates, avoiding resource-intensive look-up tables and achieving superior processing speed. Our hardware design delivers significant speed improvements of 100 times over software implementations and operates effectively within a 100 MHz clock while demonstrating low resource usage. Furthermore, a custom digital signal processing block supports CAN protocol integration, handling message alignment and synchronization to maintain signal integrity under automotive environmental noise. Our work provides a power-efficient, robust cryptographic solution that prepares automotive systems for quantum-era security challenges, emphasizing lightweight cryptography’s readiness for real-world deployment in automotive industries. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop