Security in wireless body area networks: From in-body to off-body communications

Muhammad Usman*, Muhammad Rizwan Asghar, Imran Shafique Ansari, Marwa Qaraqe

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

45 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Wireless body area networks (WBANs) play a vital role in shaping today's healthcare systems. Given the critical nature of a WBAN in one's health to automatically monitor and diagnose health issues, security and privacy of these healthcare systems need a special attention. In this paper, we first propose a novel four-tier architecture of remote health monitoring system and then identify the security requirements and challenges at each tier. We provide a concise survey of the literature aimed at improving the security and privacy of WBANs and then present a comprehensive overview of the problem. In particular, we stress that the inclusion of in vivo nano-networks in a remote healthcare monitoring system is imperative for its completeness. To this end, we elaborate on security threats and concerns in nano-networks and medical implants as well as we emphasize on presenting a holistic framework of an overall ecosystem for WBANs, which is essential to ensure end-to-end security. Lastly, we discuss some limitations of current WBANs.

Original languageEnglish
Article number8481660
Pages (from-to)58064-58074
Number of pages11
JournalIEEE Access
Volume6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2018

Keywords

  • WBAN
  • healthcare systems
  • implants
  • in-vivo communication
  • nano-networks
  • privacy
  • remote monitoring
  • security
  • wearables

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