{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,29]],"date-time":"2026-05-29T11:26:01Z","timestamp":1780053961495,"version":"3.54.0"},"reference-count":41,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,2,7]],"date-time":"2020-02-07T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1581033600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Computers"],"abstract":"<jats:p>There has been an increase in the usage of Internet of Things (IoT), which has recently become a rising area of interest as it is being extensively used for numerous applications and devices such as wireless sensors, medical devices, sensitive home sensors, and other related IoT devices. Due to the demand to rapidly release new IoT products in the market, security aspects are often overlooked as it takes time to investigate all the possible vulnerabilities. Since IoT devices are internet-based and include sensitive and confidential information, security concerns have been raised and several researchers are exploring methods to improve the security among these types of devices. Software defined networking (SDN) is a promising computer network technology which introduces a central program named \u2018SDN Controller\u2019 that allows overall control of the network. Hence, using SDN is an obvious solution to improve IoT networking performance and overcome shortcomings that currently exist. In this paper, we (i) present a system model to effectively use SDN with IoT networks; (ii) present a solution for mitigating man-in-the-middle attacks against IoT that can only use HTTP, which is a critical attack that is hard to defend; and (iii) implement the proposed system model using Raspberry Pi, Kodi Media Center, and Openflow Protocol. Our system implementation and evaluations show that the proposed technique is more resilient to cyber-attacks.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/computers9010008","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,2,7]],"date-time":"2020-02-07T11:50:28Z","timestamp":1581076228000},"page":"8","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":116,"title":["Improving Internet of Things (IoT) Security with Software-Defined Networking (SDN)"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"9","author":[{"given":"Abdullah","family":"Al Hayajneh","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Doctoral Programs, Capitol Technology University, Laurel, MD 20708, USA"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Md Zakirul Alam","family":"Bhuiyan","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Computer and Information Sciences, Fordham University, New York, NY 10458, USA"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ian","family":"McAndrew","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Doctoral Programs, Capitol Technology University, Laurel, MD 20708, USA"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,2,7]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Gan, G., Lu, Z., and Jiang, J. (2011, January 16\u201318). Internet of Things Security Analysis. Proceedings of the 2011 International Conference on Internet Technology and Applications, Wuhan, China.","DOI":"10.1109\/ITAP.2011.6006307"},{"key":"ref_2","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Software-Defined Networking: The New Norm for Networks. Available online: https:\/\/www.opennetworking.org\/images\/stories\/downloads\/sdn-resources\/white-papers\/wp-sdn-newnorm.pdf."},{"key":"ref_3","unstructured":"Tariq, J., Riaz, T., and Rasheed, A. (2014, January 12\u201313). A Layer2 Firewall for Software Defined Network. Proceedings of the 2014 Conference on Information Assurance and Cyber Security (CIACS), Rawalpindi, Pakistan."},{"key":"ref_4","unstructured":"Michelle, S., Park, S.H., Lee, B., and Yang, S. (2013, January 27\u201328). Building Firewall over the Software-Defined Network Controller. Proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Advanced Communication Technology, Chennal, India."},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Pena, J.G.V., and Yu, W.E. (March, January 26). Development of a Distributed Firewall Using Software Defined Networking Technology. Proceedings of the 2014 4th IEEE International Conference on Information Science and Technology, Busab, Korea.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICIST.2014.6920514"},{"key":"ref_6","unstructured":"Rolbin, M. (2013). Early Detection of Network Threats Using Software Defined Network (SDN) and Virtualization. [Master\u2019s Thesis, Carleton University]."},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"453","DOI":"10.1109\/JIOT.2015.2480421","article-title":"Software-Defined Wireless Networking Opportunities and Challenges for Internet-of-Things: A review","volume":"3","author":"Sood","year":"2015","journal-title":"IEEE Int. Things J."},{"key":"ref_8","unstructured":"Zhijing, Q., Denker, G., Giannelli, C., Bellavista, P., and Venkatasubramanian, N. (2014, January 5\u20139). A Software Defined Networking Architecture for the Internet-of-Things. Proceedings of the 2014 IEEE Network Operations and Management Symposium (NOMS), Krakow, Poland."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"453","DOI":"10.1007\/s12652-015-0290-y","article-title":"SDIoT: A software defined based internet of things framework","volume":"6","author":"Yaser","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Ambient. Intell. Humaniz. Comput."},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"55","DOI":"10.1109\/MCOM.2015.7263373","article-title":"Software-defined internet of things for smart urban sensing","volume":"53","author":"Liu","year":"2015","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Mag."},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Salman, O., Abdallah, S., Elhajj, I.H., Chehab, A., and Kayssi, A. (2016, January 7\u20139). Identity-Based Authentication Scheme for the Internet of Things. Proceedings of the 2016 IEEE Symposium on Computers and Communication (ISCC), Wroc\u0142aw, Poland.","DOI":"10.1109\/ISCC.2016.7543884"},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Chakrabarty, S., Engels, D.W., and Thathapudi, S. (2015, January 19\u201322). Black SDN for the Internet of Things. Proceedings of the 2015 IEEE 12th International Conference on Mobile Ad Hoc and Sensor Systems, Dallas, TX, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/MASS.2015.100"},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"42","DOI":"10.1109\/MCOM.001.1900056","article-title":"A Multi-Protocol Software-Defined Networking Solution for the Internet of Things","volume":"57","author":"Theodorou","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Mag."},{"key":"ref_14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Tran, A.K., Piran, M., and Pham, C. (2019). SDN Controller Placement in IoT Networks: An Optimized Submodularity-Based Approach. Sensors, 19.","DOI":"10.3390\/s19245474"},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Molina Zarca, A., Garcia-Carrillo, D., Bernal Bernabe, J., Ortiz, J., Marin-Perez, R., and Skarmeta, A. (2019). Enabling virtual AAA management in SDN-based IoT networks. Sensors, 19.","DOI":"10.3390\/s19020295"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Lu, Y., Ling, Z., Zhu, S., and Tang, L. (2017). SDTCP: Towards datacenter TCP congestion control with SDN for IoT applications. Sensors, 17.","DOI":"10.3390\/s17010109"},{"key":"ref_17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"70","DOI":"10.1109\/MNET.2017.1600290","article-title":"Security-Aware and Privacy-Preserving D2D Communications in 5G","volume":"31","author":"Zhang","year":"2017","journal-title":"IEEE Netw."},{"key":"ref_18","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Raspberry pi\u2014Teach, Learn, and Make with Raspberry pi. Available online: https:\/\/www.raspberrypi.org\/."},{"key":"ref_19","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Kodi j Open Source Home Theatre Software. Available online: http:\/\/kodi.tv\/."},{"key":"ref_20","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Overview of the Internet of Things. Available online: https:\/\/www.itu.int\/rec\/T-REC-Y.2060\u2013201206-I."},{"key":"ref_21","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"34","DOI":"10.1109\/MITP.2017.3680952","article-title":"Security and privacy for a green internet of things","volume":"19","author":"Szymanski","year":"2017","journal-title":"IT Prof."},{"key":"ref_22","unstructured":"Alam, T. (2018). A Reliable Communication Framework and Its Use in Internet of Things (IoT). Int. J. Sci. Res. Comput. Sci. Eng. Inf. Technol., 2456\u20133307."},{"key":"ref_23","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2481","DOI":"10.1007\/s11276-014-0761-7","article-title":"Security of the Internet of Things: Perspectives and challenges","volume":"20","author":"Jing","year":"2014","journal-title":"Wireless Netw."},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"46","DOI":"10.1109\/MC.2013.74","article-title":"Cyberentity security in the internet of things","volume":"46","author":"Ning","year":"2013","journal-title":"Computer"},{"key":"ref_25","unstructured":"Palan, V. (2020, January 05). National Privacy Day Panel: Driving Privacy and Security in IoT. Available online: https:\/\/www.intertrust.com\/intertrustblog\/national-privacy-day-panel-driving-privacy-and-security-in-iot\/."},{"key":"ref_26","unstructured":"Dhanjani, N. (2015). Abusing the Internet of Things: Blackouts, Freakouts, and Stakeouts, O\u2019Reilly Media, Inc."},{"key":"ref_27","unstructured":"Leswing, K. (2020, January 05). A massive cyberattack knocked out major websites across the internet. Available online: https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/amazon-spotify-twitter-github-and-etsy-down-in-apparent-dns-attack-2016-10?r=UK."},{"key":"ref_28","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Hu, F. (2016). Security and Privacy in Internet of Things (IoTs): Models, Algorithms, and Implementations, CRC Press.","DOI":"10.1201\/b19516"},{"key":"ref_29","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). OWASP Internet of Things Project. Available online: https:\/\/www.owasp.org\/index.php\/OWASP_Internet_of_Things_Project#tab=IoT_Top_10."},{"key":"ref_30","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"5591","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2016.2607786","article-title":"SDN and virtualization solutions for the Internet of Things: A survey","volume":"4","author":"Bizanis","year":"2016","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_31","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"186","DOI":"10.1109\/MCOM.2017.1700714","article-title":"Securing internet of things with software defined networking","volume":"56","author":"Kalkan","year":"2017","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Mag."},{"key":"ref_32","unstructured":"Nobakht, M., Sivaraman, V., and Boreli, R. (September, January 31). A Host-Based Intrusion Detection and Mitigation Framework for Smart Home IoT using OpenFlow. Proceedings of the IEEE 11th International. Conference Availability, Reliability and Security (ARES), Salzburg, Austria."},{"key":"ref_33","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bull, P., Austin, R., Popov, E., Sharma, M., and Watson, R. (2016, January 22\u201324). Flow Based Security for IoT Devices Using an SDN Gateway. Proceedings of the 2016 IEEE 4th International Conference on Future Internet of Things and Cloud (FiCloud), Vienna, Austria.","DOI":"10.1109\/FiCloud.2016.30"},{"key":"ref_34","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Kodi Media Center Vulnerability Exposes Users to Man-in-the-Middle Attacks. Available online: https:\/\/hotforsecurity.bitdefender.com\/blog\/kodi-media-center-vulnerability-exposes-users-to-man-in-the-middle-attacks-12065.html."},{"key":"ref_35","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2347","DOI":"10.1109\/COMST.2015.2444095","article-title":"Internet of things: A survey on enabling technologies, protocols, and applications","volume":"17","author":"Guizani","year":"2015","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutor."},{"key":"ref_36","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Mininet: An Instant Virtual Network on Your Laptop (or Other PC). Available online: http:\/\/mininet.org\/."},{"key":"ref_37","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Mitmproxy. Available online: https:\/\/mitmproxy.org\/."},{"key":"ref_38","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). ROOT. Available online: http:\/\/mirrors.kodi.tv\/."},{"key":"ref_39","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). Open vSwitch. Available online: https:\/\/openvswitch.org\/."},{"key":"ref_40","unstructured":"(2020, January 05). OpenSSL. Available online: https:\/\/www.openssl.org."},{"key":"ref_41","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Polverini, M., Gal\u00e1n-Jim\u00e9nez, J., Lavacca, F.G., Cianfrani, A., and Eramo, V. (2019, January 1\u20133). Dynamic In-Network Classification for Service Function Chaining ready SDN Networks. Proceedings of the 2019 10th International Conference on the Network of the Future (NoF 1019), Rome, Italy.","DOI":"10.1109\/NoF47743.2019.9014919"}],"container-title":["Computers"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-431X\/9\/1\/8\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T08:55:38Z","timestamp":1760172938000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-431X\/9\/1\/8"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2020,2,7]]},"references-count":41,"journal-issue":{"issue":"1","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,3]]}},"alternative-id":["computers9010008"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/computers9010008","relation":{},"ISSN":["2073-431X"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2073-431X","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2020,2,7]]}}}