Geocasting in vehicular communication has witnessed significant attention due to the benefits of location oriented information dissemination in vehicular traffic environments. Various measures have been applied to enhance geocasting performance including dynamic relay area selection, junction nodes incorporation, caching integration, and geospatial distribution of nodes. However, the literature lacks towards geocasting under malicious relay vehicles leading to cybersecurity concern in vehicular traffic environments. In this context, this paper presents Cybersecurity Measures for Geocasting in Vehicular traffic environments (CMGV) focusing on security oriented vehicular connectivity. Specifically, a vehicular intrusion prevention technique is developed to measure the connectivity between the cache agent and cache user vehicles. The connectivity between static transport vehicles and cache agent/cache user is measured via vehicular intrusion detection approach. The performance of the proposed vehicular cybersecurity measure is evaluated in realistic traffic environments. The comparative performance evaluation attests the benefits of security oriented geocasting in vehicular traffic environments.

Energy efficiency is a significant characteristic of battery-run devices such as sensors, RFID and mobile phones. In the present scenario, this is the most prominent requirement that must be served while introducing a communication protocol for an IoT environment. IoT network success and performance enhancement depend heavily on optimization of energy consumption that enhance the lifetime of IoT nodes and the network. In this context, this paper presents a comprehensive review on energy efficiency techniques used in IoT environments. The techniques proposed by researchers have been categorized based on five different layers of the energy architecture of IoT. These five layers are named as sensing, local processing and storage, network/communication, cloud processing and storage, and application. Specifically, the significance of energy efficiency in IoT environments is highlighted. A taxonomy is presented for the classification of related literature on energy efficient techniques in IoT environments. Following the taxonomy, a critical review of literature is performed focusing on major functional models, strengths and weaknesses. Open research challenges related to energy efficiency in IoT are identified as future research directions in the area. The survey should benefit IoT industry practitioners and researchers, in terms of augmenting the understanding of energy efficiency and its IoT-related trends and issues.

Aerial ad-hoc networks have the potential to enable smart services while maintaining communication between the ground system and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). Previous research has focused on enabling aerial data-centric smart services while integrating the benefits of aerial objects such as UAVs in hostile and non-hostile environments. Quality of service (QoS) provisioning in UAV-assisted communication is a challenging research theme in aerial ad-hoc networks environments. Literature on aerial ad hoc networks lacks cooperative service-oriented modeling for distributed network environments, relying on costly static base station-oriented centralized network environments. Towards this end, this paper proposes a quality of service provisioning framework for a UAV-assisted aerial ad hoc network environment (QSPU) focusing on reliable aerial communication. The UAV’s aerial mobility and service parameters are modelled considering highly dynamic aerial ad-hoc environments. UAV-centric mobility models are utilized to develop a complete aerial routing framework. A comparative performance evaluation demonstrates the benefits of the proposed aerial communication framework. It is evident that QSPU outperforms the state-of-the-art techniques in terms of a number of service-oriented performance metrics in a UAV-assisted aerial ad-hoc network environment.

Smart healthcare systems provide user-centric medical services to patients based on collected information of patients inducing personal health information (PHI) and personal identifiable information (PII). The information (PII and PHI) flows into the smart healthcare system with or without any regulation and patient concern with the help of new information and communication technologies (ICT). The use of ICT comes with the security and privacy issues of collected PII and PHI data. The Europe Union has published the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to regulate the flow of personal information. Towards this end, this paper proposes a blockchain-based data storage and sharing framework for a smart healthcare system that complies with the “Privacy by Design” rule of the GDPR. The personal information collected from patients is stored on off-chain storage (IPFS), and other information is stored on the blockchain ledger, which is visible to all participants. The smart contracts are designed to share the PII data with another participant based on prior permission of the data owner. The proposed framework also includes the deletion of PII and PHI in the system as per the “Right to be Forgotten” GDPR rule. Security and privacy analyses are performed for the framework to demonstrate the security and privacy of data while sharing and at rest. The comparative performance analysis demonstrates the benefit of the proposed GDPR-compliant data storage and sharing framework using blockchain. It is evident from the reported results that the proposed framework outperforms the state-of-the-art techniques in terms of performance metrics in a smart healthcare system.

The emergence of Internet of Vehicles (IoV) has enabled the interrelation and intercommunication among numerous ubiquitous vehicles, which resulted in an un-precedented generation of heterogeneous and large amount of data. The researchers have not fully explored the various research issues in IoV network despite rapidly increased usage of vehicular fog banks in several areas through last few years. In this context, this chapter presents a comprehensive review on vehicular fog banks for next-generation connected traffic in IoV environment focusing on performance metrics-based studies. The performance metrics-based fog computing techniques for next-generation connected vehicular environment have been categorically described focusing on their limitations and technical contributions while considering various research metrics. The fog computing techniques suggested by researchers have been categorized based on three performance metrics existing in the research area of next-generation connected traffic. Specifically, significance of vehicular fog banks for next-generation connected traffic is highlighted. Following the performance metrics-based fog computing taxonomy, a technique-based qualitative review is carried out on various research challenges raised in next-generation connected vehicular environments while focusing on main functional components, weaknesses and strengths. The open research challenges related to vehicular fog banks for next-generation connected traffic in IoV environment are identified as future research directions in the area.

The significant expansion of connected aerial vehicles – Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)/drones – is widened in various areas because of high mobility, dynamic configuration and low maintenance cost of UAVs. The researchers have not fully explored the various research issues in aerial network despite of rapidly increased usage of UAVs in several areas over the last few years. In this context, this chapter presents a comprehensive review on autonomous and connected aerial vehicles such as UAVs/drones in Internet of Things (IoT) environments focusing on research issues-based studies. The issues-based techniques in the aerial environment have been categorically described focusing on their limitations and technical contributions while considering various research metrics. The techniques suggested by researchers have been categorized based on five various issues existing in the research area of connected aerial vehicles. These five issues are named as data collection, computing, routing, security and energy efficiency. Specifically, the significance of autonomous and connected aerial vehicles in IoT environments is highlighted. Following the issues-based taxonomy, a technique-based qualitative review is carried out on various research challenges raised in aerial environments while focusing on main functional components, weaknesses and strengths. The open research challenges related to connected aerial vehicles: UAVs and drones are identified as future research directions in the area.