{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,1]],"date-time":"2026-04-01T20:00:55Z","timestamp":1775073655061,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":55,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"8","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]],"date-time":"2025-08-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1754006400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Spanish Government (through the Cybersecurity Institute of Spain, INCIBE)"},{"name":"European Union (NextGenerationEU\/PRTR)"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Future Internet"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Rural regions face significant barriers to adopting IoT technologies, due to limited connectivity, energy constraints, and poor technical infrastructure. While urban environments benefit from advanced digital systems and cloud services, rural areas often lack the necessary conditions to deploy and evaluate secure and autonomous IoT solutions. To help overcome this gap, this paper presents the Smart Rural IoT Lab, a modular and reproducible testbed designed to replicate the deployment conditions in rural areas using open-source tools and affordable hardware. The laboratory integrates long-range and short-range communication technologies in six experimental scenarios, implementing protocols such as MQTT, HTTP, UDP, and CoAP. These scenarios simulate realistic rural use cases, including environmental monitoring, livestock tracking, infrastructure access control, and heritage site protection. Local data processing is achieved through containerized services like Node-RED, InfluxDB, MongoDB, and Grafana, ensuring complete autonomy, without dependence on cloud services. A key contribution of the laboratory is the generation of structured datasets from real network traffic captured with Tcpdump and preprocessed using Zeek. Unlike simulated datasets, the collected data reflect communication patterns generated from real devices. Although the current dataset only includes benign traffic, the platform is prepared for future incorporation of adversarial scenarios (spoofing, DoS) to support AI-based cybersecurity research. While experiments were conducted in an indoor controlled environment, the testbed architecture is portable and suitable for future outdoor deployment. The Smart Rural IoT Lab addresses a critical gap in current research infrastructure, providing a realistic and flexible foundation for developing secure, cloud-independent IoT solutions, contributing to the digital transformation of rural regions.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/fi17080351","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,4]],"date-time":"2025-08-04T15:30:06Z","timestamp":1754321406000},"page":"351","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":3,"title":["Internet of Things Platform for Assessment and Research on Cybersecurity of Smart Rural Environments"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"17","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0000-8601-3328","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Daniel","family":"Sern\u00e1ndez-Iglesias","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Escuela Internacional de Doctorado UNED (EIDUNED), Universidad Nacional de Educaci\u00f3n a Distancia (UNED), 28015 Madrid, Spain"},{"name":"Departamento de Sistemas de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Control, ETSI Inform\u00e1tica, Universidad Nacional de Educaci\u00f3n a Distancia (UNED), 28040 Madrid, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2779-4042","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Llanos","family":"Tobarra","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Departamento de Sistemas de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Control, ETSI Inform\u00e1tica, Universidad Nacional de Educaci\u00f3n a Distancia (UNED), 28040 Madrid, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-4089-9538","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Rafael","family":"Pastor-Vargas","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Departamento de Sistemas de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Control, ETSI Inform\u00e1tica, Universidad Nacional de Educaci\u00f3n a Distancia (UNED), 28040 Madrid, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5181-0199","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Antonio","family":"Robles-G\u00f3mez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Departamento de Sistemas de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Control, ETSI Inform\u00e1tica, Universidad Nacional de Educaci\u00f3n a Distancia (UNED), 28040 Madrid, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0009-3707-7582","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Pedro","family":"Vidal-Balboa","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Consorcio CA UNED en Ponferrada (INTECCA), 24401 Ponferrada, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-3102-3179","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jo\u00e3o","family":"Sarraipa","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Instituto de Desenvolvimento de Novas Tecnologias (UNINOVA), 2829-516 Caparica, Portugal"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Cvar, N., Trilar, J., Kos, A., Volk, M., and Duh, E.S. (2020). The Use of IoT Technology in Smart Cities and Smart Villages: Similarities, Differences, and Future Prospects. Sensors, 20.","DOI":"10.3390\/s20143897"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Singh, K.B., Sengar, N., Das, D., and Misra, S. (2022, January 18\u201322). Village 5.0: Enabling Technologies and its Applications in Development of Smart Village. Proceedings of the 2022 IEEE International Symposium on Smart Electronic Systems (iSES), Warangal, India.","DOI":"10.1109\/iSES54909.2022.00122"},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Alabdali, S.A., Pileggi, S.F., and Cetindamar, D. (2023). Influential Factors, Enablers, and Barriers to Adopting Smart Technology in Rural Regions: A Literature Review. Sustainability, 15.","DOI":"10.3390\/su15107908"},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"34564","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2020.2975142","article-title":"Security and Privacy in Smart Farming: Challenges and Opportunities","volume":"8","author":"Gupta","year":"2020","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Sontowski, S., Gupta, M., Chukkapalli, S.S.L., Abdelsalam, M., Mittal, S., Joshi, A., and Sandhu, R. (2020, January 1\u20133). Cyber Attacks on Smart Farming Infrastructure. Proceedings of the 2020 IEEE 6th International Conference on Collaboration and Internet Computing (CIC), Atlanta, GA, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/CIC50333.2020.00025"},{"key":"ref_6","unstructured":"(2025, March 03). GNS3. Available online: https:\/\/docs.gns3.com\/docs\/."},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bounceur, A., Marc, O., Lounis, M., Soler, J., Clavier, L., Combeau, P., Vauzelle, R., Lagadec, L., Euler, R., and Bezoui, M. (2018, January 12\u201315). CupCarbon-Lab: An IoT Emulator. Proceedings of the 2018 15th IEEE Annual Consumer Communications & Networking Conference, Las Vegas, NV, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/CCNC.2018.8319313"},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"3211","DOI":"10.1007\/s11831-020-09496-0","article-title":"A Review on Machine Learning and Deep Learning Perspectives of IDS for IoT: Recent Updates, Security Issues, and Challenges","volume":"28","author":"Thakkar","year":"2020","journal-title":"Arch. Comput. Methods Eng."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"18","DOI":"10.1186\/s42400-021-00077-7","article-title":"A critical review of intrusion detection systems in the internet of things: Techniques, deployment strategy, validation strategy, attacks, public datasets and challenges","volume":"4","author":"Khraisat","year":"2021","journal-title":"Cybersecurity"},{"key":"ref_10","first-page":"200189","article-title":"Engineering the application of machine learning in an IDS based on IoT traffic flow","volume":"17","author":"Prazeres","year":"2023","journal-title":"Intell. Syst. Appl."},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"103041","DOI":"10.1016\/j.scs.2021.103041","article-title":"IoTBoT-IDS: A novel statistical learning-enabled botnet detection framework for protecting networks of smart cities","volume":"72","author":"Ashraf","year":"2021","journal-title":"Sustain. Cities Soc."},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Tareq, I., Elbagoury, B.M., El-Regaily, S., and El-Horbaty, E.S.M. (2022). Analysis of ToN-IoT, UNW-NB15, and Edge-IIoT Datasets Using DL in Cybersecurity for IoT. Appl. Sci., 12.","DOI":"10.3390\/app12199572"},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"14","DOI":"10.1109\/MCI.2023.3332547","article-title":"AI in Industrial IoT Cybersecurity [Industrial and Governmental Activities]","volume":"19","author":"Goebel","year":"2024","journal-title":"IEEE Comput. Intell. Mag."},{"key":"ref_14","first-page":"108","article-title":"Toward generating a new intrusion detection dataset and intrusion traffic characterization","volume":"Volume 2018","author":"Sharafaldin","year":"2018","journal-title":"Proceedings of the ICISSP 2018\u20144th International Conference on Information Systems Security and Privacy"},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bourechak, A., Zedadra, O., Kouahla, M.N., Guerrieri, A., Seridi, H., and Fortino, G. (2023). At the Confluence of Artificial Intelligence and Edge Computing in IoT-Based Applications: A Review and New Perspectives. Sensors, 23.","DOI":"10.3390\/s23031639"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Moustafa, N., and Slay, J. (2015, January 10\u201312). UNSW-NB15: A Comprehensive Data set for Network Intrusion Detection systems (UNSW-NB15 Network Data Set). Proceedings of the 2015 Military Communications and Information Systems Conference (MilCIS), Canberra, Australia. Technical Report.","DOI":"10.1109\/MilCIS.2015.7348942"},{"key":"ref_17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"40281","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2022.3165809","article-title":"Edge-IIoTset: A New Comprehensive Realistic Cyber Security Dataset of IoT and IIoT Applications for Centralized and Federated Learning","volume":"10","author":"Ferrag","year":"2022","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_18","unstructured":"Gemalto, A. (2017). LoRaWAN \u2122 Security a White Paper Prepared for the LoRa Alliance\u2122 Full End-to-End Encryption for IoT Application Providers, LoRa Alliance. Technical Report."},{"key":"ref_19","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Patel, N.D., Mehtre, B.M., and Wankar, R. (2019, January 12\u201314). Simulators, Emulators, and Test-beds for Internet of Things: A Comparison. Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on loT in Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (ISMAC 2019), Palladam, India.","DOI":"10.1109\/I-SMAC47947.2019.9032519"},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Singh, A., Nandanwar, H., and Chauhan, A. (2022, January 8). Simulation Tools and Testbeds for Internet of Things(IoT): \u2018Comparative Insight\u2019. Proceedings of the 2022 2nd International Conference on Computer Science, Engineering and Applications, ICCSEA 2022, Gunupur, India.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICCSEA54677.2022.9936302"},{"key":"ref_21","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Poisson, M., Carnier, R., and Fukuda, K. (2024, January 13). GothX: A generator of customizable, legitimate and malicious IoT network traffic. Proceedings of the ACM International Conference Proceeding Series. Association for Computing Machinery, Philadelphia, PA, USA.","DOI":"10.1145\/3675741.3675753"},{"key":"ref_22","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"186","DOI":"10.1109\/TDSC.2023.3247166","article-title":"Gotham Testbed: A Reproducible IoT Testbed for Security Experiments and Dataset Generation","volume":"21","author":"Flores","year":"2024","journal-title":"IEEE Trans. Dependable Secur. Comput."},{"key":"ref_23","unstructured":"IEEE Xplore (2016). Part 11: Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications. Revision of IEEE Std 802.11-2012, IEEE."},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"912","DOI":"10.1109\/JPROC.2024.3402265","article-title":"Exploring the Boundaries of Connected Systems: Communications for Hard-to-Reach Areas and Extreme Conditions","volume":"112","author":"Imran","year":"2024","journal-title":"Proc. IEEE"},{"key":"ref_25","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"24095","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2022.3151967","article-title":"Wireless Transmissions, Propagation and Channel Modelling for IoT Technologies: Applications and Challenges","volume":"10","author":"Alobaidy","year":"2022","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_26","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1380","DOI":"10.1109\/JIOT.2024.3486369","article-title":"LoRa Communication for Agriculture 4.0: Opportunities, Challenges, and Future Directions","volume":"12","author":"Aldhaheri","year":"2024","journal-title":"IEEE Internet Things J."},{"key":"ref_27","unstructured":"LoRa Alliance (2024, October 20). What is LoRaWAN\u00ae?. Available online: https:\/\/lora-alliance.org\/about-lorawan\/."},{"key":"ref_28","unstructured":"Torres, A.V. (2024, October 20). LoRaWAN Protocol: Everything You Need to Know. Available online: https:\/\/www.wattsense.com\/blog\/communication-protocols\/what-is-lorawan\/."},{"key":"ref_29","unstructured":"C.S.A. (2024, October 25). Zigbee: The Full-Stack Solution for All Smart Devices. Available online: https:\/\/csa-iot.org\/all-solutions\/zigbee\/."},{"key":"ref_30","unstructured":"Rudresh, V. (2024, October 25). ZigBee Security: Basics (Part 1). Available online: https:\/\/research.kudelskisecurity.com\/2017\/11\/01\/zigbee-security-basics-part-1\/."},{"key":"ref_31","first-page":"12527","article-title":"Comparative Study of IOT Protocols","volume":"17","author":"Mitra","year":"2020","journal-title":"PJAEE"},{"key":"ref_32","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1841","DOI":"10.1109\/COMST.2023.3274934","article-title":"A Survey on Scalable LoRaWAN for Massive IoT: Recent Advances, Potentials, and Challenges","volume":"25","author":"Jouhari","year":"2023","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutor."},{"key":"ref_33","unstructured":"The Things Network (2024, October 20). LoRaWAN Device Classes. Available online: https:\/\/www.thethingsnetwork.org\/docs\/lorawan\/classes\/."},{"key":"ref_34","unstructured":"Prokosch, T. (2024, November 04). MQTT Protocol Guide: Everything You Need to Know. Available online: https:\/\/cedalo.com\/blog\/complete-mqtt-protocol-guide\/."},{"key":"ref_35","unstructured":"EMQX Team (2024, November 04). The Easiest Guide to getting started with MQTT. Available online: https:\/\/www.emqx.com\/en\/blog\/the-easiest-guide-to-getting-started-with-mqtt."},{"key":"ref_36","unstructured":"(2024, November 04). Beginners Guide To The MQTT Protocol. Available online: http:\/\/www.steves-internet-guide.com\/mqtt\/."},{"key":"ref_37","unstructured":"Eclipse Foundation (2024, November 20). Mosquitto MQTT Broker. Available online: https:\/\/mosquitto.org\/."},{"key":"ref_38","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Atilgan, E., Ozcelik, I., and Yolacan, E.N. (2021, January 2\u20133). MQTT Security at a Glance. Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Information Security and Cryptology, ISCTURKEY 2021, Ankara, Turkey.","DOI":"10.1109\/ISCTURKEY53027.2021.9654337"},{"key":"ref_39","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Gemirter, C.B., \u015eagatay, \u00c7., and \u015eebnem, B. (2021, January 15\u201317). A Comparative Evaluation of AMQP, MQTT and HTTP Protocols Using Real-Time Public Smart City Data. Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Computer Science and Engineering, UBMK 2021, Ankara, Turkey.","DOI":"10.1109\/UBMK52708.2021.9559032"},{"key":"ref_40","unstructured":"Upadhyay, V., Vaish, D.A., and Kokila, D.J. (2023, January 6\u20138). Internet of Things(IoT) Security: Approaches and Existing Solutions. Proceedings of the 2023 TRON Symposium (TRONSHOW), Tokyo, Japan."},{"key":"ref_41","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kaskatiiski, N., and Boyanov, L. (October, January 30). Efficiency of data exchange of IoT communication protocols. Proceedings of the International Conference Automatics and Informatics, ICAI 2021 Proceedings, Varna, Bulgaria.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICAI52893.2021.9639627"},{"key":"ref_42","unstructured":"OpenJS Foundation, and Node-RED Contributors (2024, November 18). Node-RED. Available online: https:\/\/nodered.org."},{"key":"ref_43","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Poongothai, M., Subramanian, P.M., and Rajeswari, A. (2018, January 26\u201328). Design and Implementation of IoT Based Smart Laboratory. Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Applications, Singapore.","DOI":"10.1109\/IEA.2018.8387090"},{"key":"ref_44","unstructured":"InfluxData Inc (2024, November 20). InfluxDB. Available online: https:\/\/www.influxdata.com\/."},{"key":"ref_45","unstructured":"MongoDB Inc (2024, November 20). MongoDB. Available online: https:\/\/www.mongodb.com\/."},{"key":"ref_46","unstructured":"Grafana Labs (2024, November 25). Grafana. Available online: https:\/\/grafana.com\/."},{"key":"ref_47","unstructured":"Docker Inc (2024, December 15). Docker. Available online: https:\/\/www.docker.com\/."},{"key":"ref_48","unstructured":"Arduino (2024, December 02). Arduino. Available online: https:\/\/www.arduino.cc\/."},{"key":"ref_49","unstructured":"Arduino (2024, December 02). Arduino IDE. Available online: https:\/\/www.arduino.cc\/en\/software."},{"key":"ref_50","unstructured":"Wireshark Foundation (2024, December 16). Wireshark. Available online: https:\/\/www.wireshark.org."},{"key":"ref_51","unstructured":"WinSCP.net (2025, January 20). WinSCP. Available online: https:\/\/winscp.net\/eng\/index.php."},{"key":"ref_52","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Zachos, G., Essop, I., Mantas, G., Porfyrakis, K., Ribeiro, J.C., and Rodriguez, J. (2021, January 25\u201327). Generating IoT Edge Network Datasets based on the TON_IoT Telemetry Dataset. Proceedings of the IEEE International Workshop on Computer Aided Modeling and Design of Communication Links and Networks, CAMAD, Porto, Portugal.","DOI":"10.1109\/CAMAD52502.2021.9617799"},{"key":"ref_53","unstructured":"The Things Network (2024, December 15). The Things Network. Available online: https:\/\/www.thethingsnetwork.org\/."},{"key":"ref_54","unstructured":"The Tcpdump Group (2024, December 16). Tcpdump. Available online: https:\/\/www.tcpdump.org\/."},{"key":"ref_55","unstructured":"(2024, December 16). Zeek. Available online: https:\/\/www.zeek.org."}],"container-title":["Future Internet"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1999-5903\/17\/8\/351\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,9]],"date-time":"2025-10-09T18:21:01Z","timestamp":1760034061000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1999-5903\/17\/8\/351"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]]},"references-count":55,"journal-issue":{"issue":"8","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,8]]}},"alternative-id":["fi17080351"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/fi17080351","relation":{},"ISSN":["1999-5903"],"issn-type":[{"value":"1999-5903","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]]}}}