Abstract-Computing devices already permeate working and living environments, while researchers and engineers aim to exploit the potential of pervasive systems in order to introduce new types of services and address inveterate and emerging problems. This process will lead us eventually to the era of urban computing and the Internet of Things (IoT). However, the longpromised improvements require overcoming some significant obstacles introduced by these technological advancements. One such obstacle is the lack of interoperable solutions, to facilitate the use, monitoring and management of the plethora of devices and their services. While seamless machine-to-machine (M2M) and human-to-machine (H2M) interactions are a necessity for secure and truly ubiquitous computing, the current status quo is that of a segregated and incompatible assortment of devices. The resource-constraints of the platforms integrated into smart environments, and their heterogeneity in hardware, network and overlaying technologies, only exacerbate these interoperability issues. Motivated by the above, this paper identifies three promising, standardized protocols, each following a different approach in addressing the above concerns. We evaluate the selected protocols in the context of designing and implementing an application requiring various M2M interactions, namely a policy-based access control framework for IoT devices. Thus, three variants of the application are developed, considering each protocol's intrinsic characteristics and features. Finally, the developed applications are evaluated on a common testbed of embedded devices, allowing us to extract useful conclusions concerning the protocols' performance, their intricacies and their applicability in similar applications.
Computing devices already permeate working and living environments; a trend which affects all aspects of modern everyday lives, and one which is expected to intensify in the coming years. In the residential setting, the enhanced features and services provided by said computing devices constitute what is typically referred to as a "smart home". However, the long-promised improvement in the quality of residential life cannot be realized without overcoming some significant obstacles introduced by these technological advancements. The direct interaction smart devices often have with the physical world, along with the processing, storage and communication of data pertaining to users' lives, i.e. private sensitive in nature, bring security concerns into the limelight. The resource-constraints of the platforms being integrated into a smart home environment, and their heterogeneity in hardware, network and overlaying technologies, only exacerbate the above issues. This paper presents Cross-domain Service Access Control for devices (XSACd), a framework that combines the well-studied fine-grained access control provided by the eXtensible Access Control Markup Language (XACML) with the benefits of Service Oriented Architectures through the use of the Devices Profile for Web Services (DPWS). Based on standardized technologies, it enables seamless interaction and fine-grained policy-based management of the heterogeneous embedded devices that may be found in a smart residential setting, including support for interactions between users and devices residing on different locations and networks. The proposed framework is implemented in full and its performance is evaluated on a test bed featuring relatively resource-constrained smart platforms and embedded devices.
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