SURAKSHA: A PUF-Enabled Secure Architecture for Accident Prevention and Drone-Assisted Emergency Response

Road accidents continue to be one of the leading causes of fatalities worldwide, with delayed accident detection and unreliable emergency communication significantly affecting rescue operations. Existing Internet of Vehicles (IoV) systems often rely on software-based security mechanisms that are susceptible to cyberattacks, device impersonation, and false emergency alerts, thereby compromising the reliability of intelligent transportation systems.

SURAKSHA aims to address these challenges by developing a secure, hardware-rooted framework for accident detection and emergency response. The project integrates Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) for device authentication, Artificial Intelligence (AI) for intelligent accident detection, Internet of Vehicles (IoV) technologies for real-time communication, and drone-assisted verification for rapid on-site assessment. By combining secure hardware identities, multi-sensor data fusion, trust evaluation, and autonomous drones, the proposed system seeks to establish a reliable and trustworthy emergency response ecosystem capable of significantly reducing response time while minimizing false accident alerts.

Funding Agency:

Prime Minister Early Career Research Grant (PM-ECRG) by Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF)

Total Project Cost: 65,59,425/-

Project Duration: 36 months

Principal Investigator: Dr. Himani Sikarwar