A secure and energy-efficient architecture in Internet of Things-cloud computing network by enhancing and combining three cryptographic techniques via defining new features, areas, and entities

This paper proposes a secure and energy-efficient architecture for Internet of Things-cloud (IoT-cloud) environments by integrating and enhancing three cryptographic techniques-elliptic curve digital signature algorithm (ECDSA), Zhang's short signature (ZSS), and SEPAR-within a modular, multilayered framework. Current blockchain-based cryptographic systems face several critical challenges, including security vulnerabilities, high power consumption, overhead, and data integrity issues in multi-replica scenarios. The proposed model introduces novel structural components, including a Central Third-Party Auditor (C-TPA), an optimized Hyperledger Fabric-based auditing module (HF-Audit), a lightweight hybrid encryptor (EZ), and an audit channel management entity (M-Audit). These innovations improve data integrity, public auditing, traceability, mutual authentication, anonymity, and multilayer security. The architecture also introduces two original features-chronological order and user-defined encryption hierarchies-to reduce scheduling inefficiencies and enhance customizability. Experimental results show that the proposed method reduces power consumption by 30% and time costs by 40% compared to existing methods (e.g., HF-Audit, SEPAR), while achieving 56 ms latency and 2144-bit throughput. This work significantly advances secure and scalable cryptographic design for resource-constrained IoT-cloud systems.