Abstract
In response to the security challenges inherent in the Internet of Things (IoT), in 2023, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has endorsed ASCON, a cipher suite designed to secure the communications between resource-constrained IoT devices. Thread, a popular wireless mesh protocol designed for smart homes and smart buildings, does not currently support ASCON. This thesis describes how OpenThread, the open source implementation of Thread, can be modified such that it is capable of using the encryption algorithms defined in the ASCON cipher suite. Compared to the original version of OpenThread, this thesis shows that the network performance and battery lifetime of smart home devices are not negatively impacted when OpenThread is secured by ASCON encryption. To the best of my knowledge, this thesis is the first to investigate the potential of ASCON in securing the communications of smart home devices operating under OpenThread.