PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management

The conventional supply chain management has undergone major advancements following IoT-enabled revolution. The IoT-enabled drones in particular have ignited much recent attention for package delivery in logistics. The service delivery paradigm in logistics has seen a surge in drone-assisted package...

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Main Authors: Mohammad D. Alahmadi, Ahmed S. Alzahrani, Azeem Irshad, Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-06-01
Series:Mathematics
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/13/13/2143
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author Mohammad D. Alahmadi
Ahmed S. Alzahrani
Azeem Irshad
Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry
author_facet Mohammad D. Alahmadi
Ahmed S. Alzahrani
Azeem Irshad
Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry
author_sort Mohammad D. Alahmadi
collection DOAJ
description The conventional supply chain management has undergone major advancements following IoT-enabled revolution. The IoT-enabled drones in particular have ignited much recent attention for package delivery in logistics. The service delivery paradigm in logistics has seen a surge in drone-assisted package deliveries and tracking. There have been a lot of recent research proposals on various aspects of last-mile delivery systems for drones in particular. Although drones have largely changed the logistics landscape, there are many concerns regarding security and privacy posed to drones due to their open and vulnerable nature. The security and privacy of involved stakeholders needs to be preserved across the whole chain of Supply Chain Management (SCM) till delivery. Many earlier studies addressed this concern, however with efficiency limitations. We propose a Physical Uncloneable Function (PUF)-based secure authentication protocol (PSL-IoD) using symmetric key operations for reliable last-mile drone delivery in SCM. PSL-IoD ensures mutual authenticity, forward secrecy, and privacy for the stakeholders. Moreover, it is protected from machine learning attacks and drone-related physical capture threats due to embedded PUF installations along with secure design of the protocol. The PSL-IoD is formally analyzed through rigorous security assessments based on the Real-or-Random (RoR) model. The PSL-IoD supports 26.71% of enhanced security traits compared to other comparative studies. The performance evaluation metrics exhibit convincing findings in terms of efficient computation and communication along with enhanced security features, making it viable for practical implementations.
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spelling doaj-art-30bfeac6c38844c7b3ceb0088f2e418d2025-08-20T02:36:30ZengMDPI AGMathematics2227-73902025-06-011313214310.3390/math13132143PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain ManagementMohammad D. Alahmadi0Ahmed S. Alzahrani1Azeem Irshad2Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry3Department of Software Engineering, College of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Jeddah, Jeddah 23890, Saudi ArabiaCivil Engineering Department, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah 21589, Saudi ArabiaFaculty of Computer Science, Punjab Higher Education Department, Govt Graduate College Asghar Mall Rawalpindi, Rawalpindi 46040, PakistanDepartment of Computer Science and Information Technology, Abu Dhabi University, Abu Dhabi 59911, United Arab EmiratesThe conventional supply chain management has undergone major advancements following IoT-enabled revolution. The IoT-enabled drones in particular have ignited much recent attention for package delivery in logistics. The service delivery paradigm in logistics has seen a surge in drone-assisted package deliveries and tracking. There have been a lot of recent research proposals on various aspects of last-mile delivery systems for drones in particular. Although drones have largely changed the logistics landscape, there are many concerns regarding security and privacy posed to drones due to their open and vulnerable nature. The security and privacy of involved stakeholders needs to be preserved across the whole chain of Supply Chain Management (SCM) till delivery. Many earlier studies addressed this concern, however with efficiency limitations. We propose a Physical Uncloneable Function (PUF)-based secure authentication protocol (PSL-IoD) using symmetric key operations for reliable last-mile drone delivery in SCM. PSL-IoD ensures mutual authenticity, forward secrecy, and privacy for the stakeholders. Moreover, it is protected from machine learning attacks and drone-related physical capture threats due to embedded PUF installations along with secure design of the protocol. The PSL-IoD is formally analyzed through rigorous security assessments based on the Real-or-Random (RoR) model. The PSL-IoD supports 26.71% of enhanced security traits compared to other comparative studies. The performance evaluation metrics exhibit convincing findings in terms of efficient computation and communication along with enhanced security features, making it viable for practical implementations.https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/13/13/2143authenticationInternet of Things (IoT)securitydroneslogisticssupply chain management
spellingShingle Mohammad D. Alahmadi
Ahmed S. Alzahrani
Azeem Irshad
Shehzad Ashraf Chaudhry
PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
Mathematics
authentication
Internet of Things (IoT)
security
drones
logistics
supply chain management
title PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
title_full PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
title_fullStr PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
title_full_unstemmed PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
title_short PSL-IoD: PUF-Based Secure Last-Mile Drone Delivery in Supply Chain Management
title_sort psl iod puf based secure last mile drone delivery in supply chain management
topic authentication
Internet of Things (IoT)
security
drones
logistics
supply chain management
url https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/13/13/2143
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