A decade of research on patterns and architectures for IoT security

Abstract

Security of the Internet of Things (IoT)-based Smart Systems involving sensors, actuators and distributed control loop is of paramount importance but very difficult to address. Security patterns consist of domain-independent time-proven security knowledge and expertise. How are they useful for developing secure IoT-based smart systems? Are there architectures that support IoT security? We aim to systematically review the research work published on patterns and architectures for IoT security (and privacy). Then, we want to provide an analysis on that research landscape to answer our research questions. We follow the well-known guidelines for conducting systematic literature reviews. From thousands of candidate papers initially found in our search process, we have systematically distinguished and analyzed thirty-six (36) papers that have been peer-reviewed and published around patterns and architectures for IoT security and privacy in the last decade (January 2010–December 2020). Our analysis shows that there is a rise in the number of publications tending to patterns and architectures for IoT security in the last three years. We have not seen any approach of applying systematically architectures and patterns together that can address security (and privacy) concerns not only at the architectural level, but also at the network or IoT devices level. We also explored how the research contributions in the primary studies handle the different issues from the OWASP Internet of Things (IoT) top ten vulnerabilities list. Finally, we discuss the current gaps in this research area and how to fill in the gaps for promoting the utilization of patterns for IoT security and privacy by design.