The evolution of smart home technology aims to enhance the convenience and efficiency of traditional residential living. These environments are characterized by various internet-connected appliances and systems that can be centrally or remotely contro...
The evolution of smart home technology aims to enhance the convenience and efficiency of traditional residential living. These environments are characterized by various internet-connected appliances and systems that can be centrally or remotely controlled. However, leveraging network-based systems exposes them to various vulnerabilities and security threats, potentially leading to privacy breaches and financial losses. This paper proposes a distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based key management protocol to facilitate secure communication within smart home environments. The key generation protocol was created by verifying the hash value of information about users and IoT devices using the Merkle Tree method of distributed ledger technology. A comparative safety and performance analysis of the proposed protocol was also conducted. The results indicate an approximate 28% efficiency improvement over traditional certificate-based key generation protocols. Additionally, this paper outlines security policies and research directions for implementing the proposed protocol in smart home settings to provide a safer environment.