UAV Message Authentication via Cryptographic Mesh

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Solution Overview

Problem

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) face challenges in secure communication and trustworthiness when operating out of communication range or in large fleets, as they are vulnerable to interference and managing complex operations becomes difficult.

Innovation Solution

Implementing a secure mesh network using digital certificates and private cryptographic keys for authentication, allowing UAVs to verify the authenticity of messages and determine trustworthiness through cryptographic verification, and enabling message processing and task management within the fleet.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Extent of automation

If unmanned vehicles operate out of communication range or in large fleets, then operational autonomy and task capability are improved, but vulnerability to malicious interference and difficulty in managing trustworthiness increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveoperational autonomyVSAvoidtrustworthiness verification

Core Design Contradiction:

Extent of automationVSReliability

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary authentication by digitally signing messages with cryptographic keys before transmission. Each unmanned vehicle receives digital certificates and private keys in advance, enabling autonomous verification of message authenticity without requiring real-time communication with the central controller, thus resolving the trustworthiness issue while maintaining operational autonomy

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

Digital certificates and cryptographic signatures serve as intermediaries between the central controller and unmanned vehicles. These cryptographic mechanisms mediate the trust relationship, allowing vehicles to verify message authenticity independently without direct continuous communication, thereby enabling autonomous operation while ensuring reliability

Inventive Principle:

Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

2Reliability

If secure authentication using digital certificates and cryptographic keys is implemented, then message authenticity and trustworthiness are improved, but computational overhead and communication protocol complexity increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemessage authenticityVSAvoidauthentication protocol complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The complex cryptographic verification process is extracted and pre-configured into the unmanned vehicles during initialization. Each vehicle receives its digital certificate and private key beforehand, so that during operation, only simple signature verification is needed rather than full cryptographic protocol execution, reducing real-time computational overhead while maintaining security

Inventive Principle:

Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Solution Approach 2:

The central controller creates and distributes copies of digital certificates and private keys to each unmanned vehicle. These cryptographic credentials are replicated and stored locally, enabling each vehicle to independently verify messages without requiring complex real-time communication with the controller, thus simplifying the authentication protocol while ensuring message authenticity

Inventive Principle:

Principle #26Copying

3Object-affected harmful factors

If cryptographic verification and digital signature validation are performed for each message, then security against malicious interference is improved, but message processing time and computational resources increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemalicious interference resistanceVSAvoidmessage processing time

Core Design Contradiction:

Object-affected harmful factorsVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

Cryptographic credentials (digital certificates and private keys) are preliminarily configured in each unmanned vehicle before deployment. This pre-configuration enables rapid signature verification during message processing without requiring complex real-time cryptographic operations, thus reducing message processing time while maintaining security against malicious interference

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The patent replaces complex mechanical or procedural authentication mechanisms with cryptographic signature verification. This substitution uses mathematical properties of digital signatures to provide security against malicious interference while requiring minimal computational resources and processing time compared to traditional authentication methods

Inventive Principle:

Principle #28Mechanics substitution (Replace mechanical system)

Data Source

PatentUS9930027B2Authenticated messages between unmanned vehicles

Publication Date: 2018.03.27 AMAZON TECH INC

AI summary

An unmanned vehicle communicates with other unmanned vehicles. When the unmanned vehicle receives a message from another unmanned vehicle, the unmanned vehicle verifies authenticity of the message. For at least some types of messages, if determined that the message is authentic, the unmanned vehicle updates a set of operations the unmanned vehicle will perform in accordance with information in the message.