Abstract
The Internet of Drones (IoD) brings an unprecedented prospect for massive aerial data acquisition; on the other hand, it meets severe hindrances in how to accomplish robust, secure, and economic identity authentication with the limited resources available. In this paper, ChebIoD (Chebyshev polynomial-based mutual authentication and session key generation) is proposed as a new mutual authentication and session key agreement protocol for IoD environments. ChebIoD differs from the existing methods of blockchain, PUF, and ECC in that it consolidates three elaborate mechanisms: (a) post-quantum-oriented design methodology; (b) a dynamic solution for key update/revocation scheme; and (c) formal verification using BAN logic, Real-Or-Random (ROR) model, and AVISPA. The principal difference is that we are able to assign a precise definition of security for key privacy; namely, the protocol achieves both forward and backward secrecy along with performance gains for lightweight polynomial computations without requiring exponential hard assumptions. An Enhanced Security Assessment covers side-channel threats as well as the robustness of the Trusted Authority. We also show an updated performance comparison to the IoD-specific AKE protocols and state-of-the-art schemes in recent works on Blockchain-, Physical Unclonable Function (PUF)-, Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC)-, and Chebyshev-based approaches. In identical simulation settings, ChebIoD decreases computation time by up to 63.5%, reduces communication overhead by up to 62.4%, and lowers energy consumption by up to 66.7%, compared to state-of-the-art solutions. These improvements are consistent across multiple baselines, though the exact gains vary depending on the compared protocol. The practical utility is showcased by actual IoD projects for disaster response, precision agriculture, and urban air mobility solutions. Overall, ChebIoD demonstrates efficient and scalable authentication for IoD under simulation.