Empowering Next-Generation IoT WLANs Through Blockchain and 802.11ax Technologies

Blockchain emerges as a potential solution for enabling distributed management and accountability of wireless Internet of Thing (IoT) networks. In addition, blockchain offers increased IoT security, as it involves every single node around the network to verify and approve new transactions. On the other hand, IEEE 802.11ax, a recently concluded WiFi standard aimed at achieving high network efficiency, plays a key role for solving spectrum sharing and cross-technology coexistence among WiFi and 6G cellular users, one of the key challenges faced by next-generation wireless systems. In this paper, we leverage the power of blockchain and 802.11ax technologies to propose a medium access control (MAC) protocol design for future IoT wireless local area networks (WLANs), also referred to as wireless IoT-Blockchain networks setup. Our simulation results show that the proposed protocol design enhances transmission latency and achievable network throughput.