A Lightweight Layered Blockchain Based Framework For End to End IoT Data Integrity Verification in Resource Constrained Environments

Abstract

The rapid growth of Internet of Things (IoT) applications has intensified the need for trustworthy data management, particularly in resource-constrained environments where sensor data are used for critical decision-making. Ensuring data integrity in such environments remains a major challenge due to the limited computational and energy resources of IoT devices. This study proposes and implements a lightweight layered framework for end-to-end IoT data integrity verification that integrates device-level encryption, centralized hashing, and blockchain-based auditing.

The framework employs ESP32-based IoT devices to perform data acquisition and AES-128 end-to-end encryption, a Node.js backend server for decryption, validation, database storage, and SHA-256 hashing, and the Polygon blockchain as an immutable ledger for recording data hashes. Sensor data are encrypted directly at the device layer and transmitted securely to the backend, where integrity hashes are generated and asynchronously recorded on the blockchain.

Experimental results show that 100% of sensor data were successfully transmitted and processed, with an average backend response time of 43 ms and memory usage below 40% on IoT devices. All manipulated data were detected through hash mismatch verification. Unlike existing IoT–blockchain approaches that tightly couple blockchain operations with IoT devices, this framework explicitly decouples encryption, hashing, and blockchain anchoring across system layers. These results demonstrate that the proposed framework effectively guarantees data integrity and auditability without imposing significant overhead on resource-constrained IoT devices, making it suitable for real-world IoT deployments.