Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188

https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-022-07555-1

RESEARCH ARTICLE-COMPUTER ENGINEERING AND COMPUTER SCIENCE

IoT with Multimedia Investigation: A Secure Process of Digital

Forensics Chain-of-Custody using Blockchain Hyperledger Sawtooth
Abdullah Ayub Khan1,2 · Aftab Ahmed Shaikh1 · Asif Ali Laghari1

Received: 14 October 2022 / Accepted: 12 December 2022 / Published online: 24 December 2022
© King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals 2022

Abstract
Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled wireless surveillance systems are gaining more attention because of the robust development in
information technology. It is due to the versatile distributed application features and improved performance of the technology,
which required proper investigation. In a multimedia environment, video captured by surveillance cameras is required to be
stored (uploaded) for secure preservation for the sake of futuristics analysis, especially in multimedia forensics investigation
processes. While storing large raw video files over the network and extracting features as per needs, the systems’ provenance
with the ledger integrity, reliability, transparency, availability, immutability, and trustworthiness are the main concerns. These
highlighted challenges pose a serious issue in the domain of network transmissions, where digital forensics investigation is
applied. In addition, the limited use of multimedia resource constraints over the wireless network, such as computational
power, network bandwidth, and storage created another type of challenging aspect throughout the investigation. However, the
current lifecycle is observing the most critical in terms of consecutive duplicated video frame creation. There is a need to handle
a few objects of interest, filter the frames, and investigate them before storing them on the secure digital ledger, which also
relieves the pressure of network transmission at the same time. The real-time monitoring of the blind area (which is covered
with dark shadows) of the video also affects the frame filtering accuracy. This impacts the forensics investigation hierarchy,
investigational data management, and multimedia-enabled chain-of-custody preservation. To address such challenging issues,
this paper bridges these gaps by enabling novel and secure digital forensics investigation processes using IoT-Blockchain-
based collaborative technology. A blockchain hyperledger sawtooth-enabled secure and efficient digital multimedia forensics
investigational distributed architecture is proposed. The process connects participating stakeholders to exchange details of
the investigation, including the video surveillance pre-processed frame filtering-related chain-of-custody details by creating a
private network. And so, customized consensus protocols such as proof-of-work sawtooth policies. To design and deploy such
protocols, the system enables the analysis of the overall activities of scheduled multimedia transmission before preserving them
on the distributed ledger. For automation, smart contracts are implemented to automate ledger redundancy verification and
validation, requesting for contents of video surveillance frame filtering and maintaining immutable preservation. Substantially,
it provides a secure interaction between the investigational processes because of lifecycle tuning. Through experimental results,
the proposed solution provides better performance with robust capability to track and trace real-time video surveillance, frame
auto-filtering redundancy, and object-of-interest investigation with an increased efficiency rate of 30% and reduces resource
consumption down to 11.56%.

Keywords Blockchain · Hyperledger sawtooth · Digital forensics investigation · Internet of Things (IoT) · Wireless network ·
Multimedia technology

B Abdullah Ayub Khan

abdullah.khan00763@gmail.com;
1 Department of Computer Science, Sindh Madressatul Islam
abdullah.ayub@bbsul.edu.pk
University, Karachi 74000, Pakistan
Aftab Ahmed Shaikh
2 Department of Computing Science and Information
aftab.shaikh@smiu.edu.pk
Technology, Benazir Bhutto Shaheed University Lyari,
Asif Ali Laghari Karachi 75660, Pakistan
asif.laghari@smiu.edu.pk

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1 Introduction information for applications of video surveillance. Substan-

tially, the filtering of the duplicated frames does not affect the
Nowadays, wireless video surveillance systems perform streaming quality of safety services and monitoring. It can
magnificently in every environment because of their flexible decrease the usage of wireless bandwidth. The IoT-wireless
modular infrastructure and easy installation procedure [1]. network-enabled cameras connect with other external multi-
This system performs tremendously in a distinct environ- media devices to perform different tasks, including initiating
ment, such as traffic monitoring [2], management of parking recording, storing, and interpreting. The process of foren-
systems [3], and public/private security protection in offices, sics investigation is applied if any suspicious activity occurs,
campuses, commercials, and residential communities [4, 5]. then the ecosystem restricts. While preserving distributed
The advancement and developments in information technol- chain-of-evidence in various storage channels along with
ogy, especially the collaborative approach of the Internet of managing frame redundancy, reducing the consumption of
Things (IoT) with wireless communication make the system transmission bandwidth [17], and turning security surveil-
more widely adopted in different applications, including real- lance into smart security and safety management. It has
time video surveillance, which requires video-related data significantly improved security-related procedures in various
feeding, examining, analyzing, and storing [6] (as shown in areas, including commercial, by enabling a more robust and
Fig. 1). However, the published report on worldwide fore- insightful response to wireless video surveillance incidents.
casting 2020 [7], the real-time video surveillance monitoring However, organizations are facing considerable issues in
system would expand by nearly 11%. Whereas the exponen- securing wireless video surveillance digital infrastructures
tial usage of IoT-video surveillance over the world reported, against different kinds of cyber-or cloud-based multime-
from 2019 to 2024 [8]. In this scenario, the current market is dia surveillance and virtual tampering and storage-related
expected to increase from $45.5 billion to nearly $69.7 bil- attacks [18]. The main aim of digital forensics is to per-
lion [9]. For instance, with the increasing rate of monitoring form a process of digital investigation that maintain a secure
infrastructure and the size of the area being enlarged to cover report of malicious attacks, collects all the details, and
the number of cameras, this increasing number of multime- presents chain-of-evidence to the court of law to determine
dia streaming leads to serious challenges in transmission and the actual involvement and purpose of crime on a digital
their digital investigation through resource constraint net- infrastructure over cyber environment. And so, the process
work technology [10].
Current commercial-based solutions reduce the load of
wireless transmission through the cameras, which is based
on real-time detection and streaming encoding. It presents
low video pixel utilization in the form of spatial and temporal
reduction, respectively [11]. The former solution is proposed,
where the cameras are used only for initiating recording
and wirelessly transmitting video when the different level
between multiple sequences of frames is over the threshold
[12]. However, various duplication frames are uploaded on
cloud storage, which poses a serious challenge in terms of
analyzing every aspect of records. On the other side, the ben-
efit of capturing real-time frames of every second makes the
system able to get a positive investigational solution [13].
For instance, the private and public sectors require security
monitoring along with that commercial and residential com-
munities are also more concern. Over the frames capturing
and filtering, various task can be possible through this, such
as people’s suspicious activities, movements, vehicular iden-
tifications, and drone operations. While these video frames
containing garbage means frame duplication, which effects
in the process of real-time collection along with examina-
tion while further digital investigation [14–16]. In addition,
this paper focusing on the temporal video pixel reduction of
the wirelessly transmitted multimedia quantity, in which a
large number of duplicated frames are transmitted in the data
streaming. Most importantly, it contains very little useful Fig. 1 Current process of video surveillance and investigation

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is also responsible for mitigating and incident responding
to such IoT-cloud surveillance-related attacks. The digital
forensics process is admired as it is used to capture wire-
less video surveillance transmitted data (sequence of frames
and extract object-of-interest), examine, analyze, store, and
prove facts to convict the stakeholders involved in this crime
[19, 20]. This investigation led to the process of acquisi-
tion of the collected data for detailed evaluation; the findings
from this analysis of different attributes helped to further
interpret the crime incident and were then documented as
the forensics law enforcement report, which the admirable
deposition and testimonials represented in front of the jury
[21]. It is also critical to maintain the transparency and
secrecy of the digital investigation process [22]. A digi-
tal forensics with blockchain can store surveillance-related
evidence and make a proper chain-of-custody transactions
with an immutable digital distributed ledger preservation,
which enables a transparent process of multimedia investi-
gation. The wireless multimedia surveillance-enabled events
(incidents) occurrence is preserved in a gazette chain order
connected via various transmission channels in a permis-
sioned private Sawtooth network [23], such as on-chain and
off-chain. The Sawtooth business logic (digital contracts) is
designed to achieve secure multimedia forensics investiga-
tions, which are hard to tamper with because it is protected
with a hash (SHA-256) encrypted. In addition, these pro-
tected ledgers in terms of chain-of-evidence are stored in
distributed file system storage (InterPlanetary file system,
IPFS), which is immutable in nature [24]. The decentralized
nature of blockchain technology also enables digital foren-
sics to enhance the investigational node defense ability using
cryptographic encryption, and the deployment of intrusion
detection provides prevention dynamically for wireless video
surveillance and related monitoring systems. The installation
of anti-disclosure and firewall authentication software tools
creates a new paradigm in the digital investigation environ-
ment. Along with that, consensus policies and the digital
signature of the hyperledger network guarantee robust secu-
rity, protection, and privacy with efficient node deliverance in
terms of immutability, integrity, transparency, and distributed
node trust within the IoT-real time multimedia-related case
under investigation [25].
1.1 Motivation, Objectives, Contributions,
and Section Distribution
This research paper deals with a secure and efficient
IoT-enabled real-time video surveillance architecture, a
blockchain hyperledger sawtooth-enabled digital forensics
investigation in multimedia technology. The proposed IoT-
blockchain video surveillance, automation transmission over
the wireless network and provide proper multimedia-related
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dynamic data transparency, provenance, tracking, traceabil-
ity, immutability, and assurance for performing different
operations (dynamic camera surveillance rotation, zoom,
capture-specific objects, frame filter analysis, and object-of-
interest preservation). And so, the proposed camera controls
surveillance maintains trust between the IoT-enabled real-
time automation, including the external multimedia mon-
itoring devices while sending, receiving, analyzing, inter-
preting, and recording the surveillance (sensing) into camera
action (wireless network transmission). It also ensures the
privacy protection for the complete node transactions of IoT-
surveillance-to-multimedia systems stored in a blockchain
distributed ledger of video surveillance-related frame filter-
based and point-of-interest data in a NuCypher Threshold
Re-encryption private network; it helps to examine and ana-
lyze the surveillance-based criminal activity by applying
process of a digital forensics investigation. The main objec-
tives and contributions of this research are as follows:
• In this paper, we present a detailed design of the
IoT-blockchain-enabled wireless video surveillance-based
investigational processes for multimedia forensics. And
so, the paper highlights various related issues, limitations,
and security protection challenges of the current systems
faced in the analytical hierarchy of examination and com-
putation, which is because of the unstructured lifecycle of
multimedia forensics.
• A novel and secure wireless video surveillance monitoring
architecture are proposed, that aims to collect records in
real-time and process this information forensically, such
as chain-of-custody. It is presented that the proposed IoT-
blockchain uses a hyperledger Sawtooth-enabled video
monitoring in accordance with the frame filtering, col-
laborative validation, and object-of-interest for digital
investigation analysis.
• In this paper, a security procedure follows to protect trans-
actions from one end to another; the system uses NuCypher
Proxy Re-encryption algorithms with digital (smart) con-
tracts. The design and development of such contracts
support a multi-proof-of-work consensus protocol that cre-
ates a secure channel between participating stakeholders,
such as registration, video surveillance ledger transmis-
sion, forensics transaction process validation/verification,
and transaction updates on the private network.
• Sequence diagrams of this customized private permis-
sioned hyperledger Sawtooth network simulate the work-
ing operations of the proposed architecture. In addition,
the authors choose this module since Hyperledger Saw-
tooth is an open-source, distributed blockchain platform
employing intelligent smart contract functionality is also
highlighted.
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• For the proposed IoT-Blockchain, various implementation structure is designed. The main target is to provide the cur-
challenges and limitations rises that become open issues rent IoT-multimedia forensics investigational information
for futuristic developments are separated and discussed. integrity, transparency, confidentiality, provenance, secure
storage, and resist forgery or tampering.
Several blockchain hyperledger-forensics-based methods
The rest of the paper is structured as follows. In Sect. 2,
concentrate on specific solutions that include a combination
we discuss various IoT-blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth-
of IoT-blockchain enabled distributed technology and dig-
enabled real-time video surveillance, monitoring, and secu-
ital forensic investigation processes and strategies [37], as
rity and digital forensics secure architectures for multimedia
discussed and mentioned in Table 1. In our proposed solu-
process investigation and chain-of-custody related literature
tion, we cover the complete process of IoT-digital forensics
and requirements. In Sect. 3, the current IoT-enabled wireless
investigation, video surveillance incident-related evidence
surveillance, forensics investigation analysis, and blockchain
collection with secure preservation and tackle various partic-
private network solution for secure ledger preservation, are
ipating stakeholders at the same time. We also provide and
discussed. Section 4 proposes the IoT-blockchain hyper-
ensure the security of the distributed network and platform
ledger Sawtooth-enabled secure architecture for the wireless
authentication that handles the evidence custody and guar-
surveillance forensics investigation process. In Sect. 5, we
antees preservation in a chronologically ordered, encrypted
discuss the working operation of the proposed architec-
ledger.
ture, and IoT-blockchain implementation limitations are
presented. Finally, conclusions appear in Sect. 6.

3 Current Wireless Surveillance Forensics

Investigation Using IoT
2 Related Work
Traditional video surveillance systems are dependent on
This section discusses various related literature on IoT-
various external equipment along with human operators.
blockchain enabling existing processes, proposed lifecycles,
And so, the evolution of the video surveillance system, the
digital forensics investigation procedures, real-time video
advent of an automated surveillance system, is gaining more
surveillance enrolment, and environmental limitations. In
attention and bringing priority because of the effectiveness,
this manner, several works are presented that highlights the
efficiency, and reliability of the system [38]. The adoption
role of cameras. Include the cameras on the edge have their
and use of advanced intelligent wireless video surveillance
own computation and communication capabilities and are
systems have recently reached a peak. This wireless intelli-
connected to the IoT-cloud via a wireless network for multi-
gent system identifies abnormal behavior and patterns in the
media transmission-related details [26]. The authors in [27,
video by developing a digital forensics investigation process
28] presented the advantages of the digital forensics pro-
with artificial intelligence. It enables efficient monitoring
cess, which offers IoT-video surveillance investigation, but
and accurate capture of the whole scenario with just a few
unfortunately, did not discuss the multimedia-based evidence
observers. Wireless IP (third generation) video surveillance
preservation solution in the run-time investigation and its
outperforms traditional video surveillance, with increased
involving events in the process of digital analysis, storage,
processing power and compression [37, 38]. For instance,
and sharing information through wireless network transmis-
this new category of wireless video surveillance has a sub-
sion based on different external portable devices on the cloud.
stantial impact on marketplace security and sensor control.
Li et al. discussed the blockchain-digital forensics investiga-
The components of this system are interconnected by several
tion framework for IoT and IPFS secure distributed storage
cameras (with connected IPs) and are ID protected. The IoT-
for evidence preservation that concerns the clear audit trail
forensics investigation process in multimedia technology and
and handles security issues, especially authentication, con-
blockchain-based solutions discussed in the subsections is as
trol access, availability, and lack of data traceability [29]. Ryu
follows.
et al. presented a blockchain-forensics investigation frame-
work for the Internet of Things. This solution is designed and
implemented to enable public network IoT-forensics investi- 3.1 IoT-Digital Forensics Investigation Process
gation for making authorship trust in the cloud [30]. in Multimedia Technology
In this paper, various related works and published litera-
ture is reviewed critically, where we found gaps in the previ- In IoT-forensics investigations, digital cameras and
ous solutions. In this manner, we proposed IoT-Blockchain multimedia devices such as mobile phones, handheld
using Hyperledger Sawtooth technology, a private per- ubiquitous devices are daily seized as a source of
missioned network (with distributed ledger transactions) evidence [39]. Video extraction from these devices

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Table 1 Related work on IoT-real
time video surveillance Research method
A blockchain-based lawful
evidence management
scheme for digital
forensics
A blockchain-based digital
forensics framework for
IoT applications
A Role of Internet of things
(IoT) in digital forensics
A recent challenges and
limitations in cloud
forensics with blockchain
Cryptography hash
algorithms are being used
to improve blockchain
security in cloud
environments
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Proposed work Research Gaps References
M. Li et al. presented a Ethereum, [31]
blockchain-enabled public network,
lawful evidence permissionless
management method, architecture
namely “LEChain”. It
highlighted that the
proposed work
supervises, handle
evidence, secure flow
control, and manage
court trails
G. Kumar et al. proposed a Cross-border legalization, [32]
blockchain-IoT public permissionless
framework for digital network structure,
forensics investigations, consortium infrastructure
which provides a using blockchain
distributed computing, ethereum
decentralized,
transparent forensics
investigation of
IoT-based digital
evidence in cross-border
environments
M. Stoyanova et al. Issues in video-based [33]
discussed the different evidence analysis,
collaborative studies of application-specific
blockchain-IoT-enabled standardization,
digital forensics certification problems in
investigation IoT-forensics,
frameworks. This paper automation,
covers several issues interoperability issues
involved in the complex
process of IoT-Forensics
investigation
O. Akter et al. presented a Evidence segregation in the [34]
blockchain-enabled cloud,
solution for IoT-cloud IP anonymity,
forensics investigation. A lack of cloud-IoT data
blockchain zone-based transparency,
approach is proposed for permissionless public
the forensics process in network
which IoT-forensics
investigations are split
into three zones (IoT,
cloud, and digital
investigation)
P. Velmurugadass et al. Hash encryption SH-256, [35]
developed cloud-based Harmony search
software, defined optimization,
networks, and altered the Elliptic curve integrated
forensics process for encryption scheme,
IoT-smart applications; public network,
this solution consists of permissionless,
nearly a hundred high security but more
multimedia external complex
devices, open flow
switches, and
blockchain-based
controllers with the cloud
server and authentication,
as well as investigation
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Table 1 (continued)
Research method Proposed work Research Gaps References

An autonomous log storage C. L. Hsu et al. presented Cross-border evidence [36]

management protocol an autonomous log
with blockchain storage management
protocol with blockchain
distributed security
technology investigation
and control access via
IoT
legality,
attribute-based control
access,
gateway and server
permission issues,
public communication,
blockchain
permissionless network

Fig. 2 Process model for IoT-forensics investigation

is widely used in digital crime evidence and inves-

tigation, which helps to find key forensics evidence
materials (and fragments of evidence items) and estab-
lish links between evidence materials [40]. The IoT-
real-time video surveillance systems are used for res-
idential as well as commercial areas, such as malls,
banks, parks, parking, stores, traffic, and transporta-
tion, where video-based evidence is retrieved from
devices that can be used as digital evidence (crime
incidents) for further investigation process as shown
in Fig. 2. Initially, the captured footage of particular
scenes in digital forensics is often used for compar-
ative analysis [39], including forensics subject areas
such as tuning of frame filtering, collaborative vali-
dation, and object-of-interest (specific objects), with
forensics expert opinion being provided on this find- Fig. 3 IoT-real time video surveillance camera distribution diagram
ing. Examine the real-time identity of suspects through
embedded facial recognition services (AI techniques).
IoT-Forensics also examine object motion detection, sleep mode, cameras capture video at a low frame rate (15–20
gesture, and cross-pose recognition, etc., for the pur- fps) [2, 39]. Every camera has its own independent video pro-
pose of smooth investigation analysis. The quality of cessing system with an embedded core processor [40]. And
the footage matters in the case investigation, poor qual- so, with no GPU, we consume less computational power on
ity would significantly reduce the level of confidence of video streaming, but unfortunately, this system cannot handle
the digital forensics investigational process [41]. Thus, high computational video capturing (only surveillance) and
the documented records cannot be presented as strong processing tasks. All these cameras are connected directly to
evidence in a court of law. the central storage, where they transmit all recorded data and
save it in different folders with date and time.
The wireless video surveillance forensics camera analysis In this way, the IoT-forensics investigation process is
process has overlapping monitoring areas at specific times- applied to the saved data, and it initiates with the video-based
tamps and communicates with the embedded short-range crime incident evidence collection to preserve and present
Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity) module via less bandwidth usage this report in the court of law, as already discussed earlier
as shown in Fig. 3. The individual camera has two distinct in this section. This complete scenario of digital evidence
modes of monitoring, one is the active mode, where cameras preservation in cloud-based (centralized server) storage is
capture video at a high frame rate (50–60 fps), while in the still insecure. To make this chain-of-evidence secure, we

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used blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth, a permissioned pri-
vate network modular architecture that provides evidence
integrity, transparency, immutability, provenance, and secure
distributed ledger storage (IPFS).
3.2 Blockchain Distributed Security and Privacy
for IoT-Forensics
This section presents the blockchain solution for IoT-
Forensics investigation that allows the decomposition and
maintain the hyperledger Sawtooth blockchain enabling real-
time video data applications and recording in a systematic
manner [41]. This solution identifies the common dimensions
and domain requirements based on blockchain security pro-
tection. The Sawtooth private permissioned network provides
a partially decentralized blockchain in which only partici-
pating nodes get permissioned by IoT-Forensics engineers in
the consensus process, digital contracts, and nodes of busi-
ness rules. The engineer also manages the stakeholders and
trusted parties and the cryptographic hash encrypted storage
which is commonly shared and exchanged by permissioned
nodes of IoT-video surveillance transactions and secures the
process of investigation [40, 41]. This modular architec-
ture demonstrates the multi-chaining concept in IoT-video
surveillance digital forensics investigation; a few crucial key
factors related to IoT-Forensics transactions and the process
of digital investigation are discussed as follows:
• On-Chain: Available distributed ledgers that are visi-
ble to the connected participating stakeholders on this
permissioned private network. It records all IoT-video
surveillance transactions on the node and shares them with
the entire forensics blockchain. Thus, since these transac-
tions are irreversible and cannot be altered (immutable),
for completing the transaction, there has to be an agreed
number of stakeholder confirmations.
• Off-Chain: These transactions are not published on the
main blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth permissioned pri-
vate network. However, the third parties (a guarantor)
who are involved in this chain are able to choose to have
an agreement outside of the blockchain, and they are
responsible for the confirmed completion of the transaction
(actual transaction execution) and certifying the agree-
ment. IoT-Forensics transactions can be carried out using a
multi-signature-based solution. This chain can be instantly
executed as compared to on-chain transactions.
Digital contracts in blockchain hyperledger sawtooth-
enabled IoT-Forensics (such as reg(), addNode(),
updateNodeTrans()) are made up of programable code
that stores files and keeps track of account balances [42].
The IoT-Forensics Sawtooth engineer executes these con-
tracts with the use of consensus protocols to agree upon the
10179
variety of actions sequentially. Whereas the participating
stakeholders can create a request by posting a transaction on
this blockchain private network.
The IoT-Forensics contracts are more accurate because the
program code is fixed and cannot be changed, which means
completely immutable; there is also a blockchain hyperledger
Sawtooth consume low execution risk, reduce cost, fewer
intermediaries, is speedy, and provide real-time updates, and
support IoT-video surveillance process of investigation and
forensics infrastructure. Moreover, it provides a securely
protected storage file structure for the process of forensics
investigation, a platform that allows preserving IoT-Forensics
incident evidence and investigation reports and presenting
these encrypted records in the court of law.
4 Real-Time Video Surveillance Forensics
Investigation Architecture Enabled by IoT
with Blockchain
The proposed architecture presents the complete IoT-
Forensics chain-of-evidence capturing hierarchy, where the
protection of video surveillance data in the distributed envi-
ronment is the main feature. Secondly, the lifecycle of
individual node transactions between participating stake-
holders is designed, that handle processes of data records
(such as capturing, examining, analyzing, preserving, pre-
senting, and documenting) through a customized Sawtooth
consensus protocol. The proposed IoT-Blockchain aims to
update the incident ledger, such as case reports, evidence col-
lection, judiciary decisions, etc. With the NuCypher Proxy
Re-encryption, it ensures the integrity and transparency of
wireless sensors-enabled cameras’ video recording preser-
vation. Whereas only IoT-Forensics Sawtooth engineers
authenticate and authorize the request of participating stake-
holders regarding the access of blockchain features, such as
reading chain-of-evidence and reporting, accessing, trans-
action updates, and submitting registration applications. It
is possible through the proposed Distributed application
(DApp), as shown in Fig. 5. In addition, Sawtooth Engineer
also manages all IoT-surveillance chain-of-evidence access
requests for approval from different stakeholders (such as
victim, accused, investigator, enforcement agency, and court
of law) over the proposed permissioned private network
which two intercommunication channels, such as on-chain
and off-chain. For instance, the case investigator/forensics
expert handles logs of video file storage management and
checks transaction redundancy and tackles the filtering video
frame sequence and collaborative validation problems by
enabling the IoT-surveillance duplication restriction and
forensics analysis tools. Whereas the evidence is preserved
in the InterPlanetary File Storage (IPFS), a distributed IoT-
Forensics video surveillance evidence storage structure. The
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10180
primary objective of this storage is to preserve case-related
transactions, recorded evidence reported and presented doc-
umentation, case trails, the court of law and settlement
information, and judiciary decisions.
However, the proposed blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth-
enabled a secure and protected IoT-Forensics investigation
architecture for real-time video surveillance. To do a secure
investigation, the process hierarchy of incidence response to
detect suspicious activities is proposed. The lifecycle of the
proposed investigation process is as follows: (i) capturing
data from cameras through wireless sensors, (ii) examin-
ing, (iii) analyzing, (iv) preserving, (v) presenting, and (vi)
documenting. There is a customized Sawtooth off-chain
communication channel designed between the stakeholders
for the sake to initiate transaction processors. This can val-
idate Sawtooth node interconnectivity (Peer-to-Peer (P2P)),
state, consensus, and CLI sawtooth as shown in Fig. 4.
On the other side, on-chain (implicit) communication con-
nects to the main sectors of IoT-Forensics real-time video
surveillance process. It works as a respondent, while inci-
dent transactions occur in the investigation hierarchy, such
as frame filtering. It provides integrity and transparency to
the Sawtooth case validator throughout implicit transaction
deliverance. To automate the transaction of the proposed
IoT-Blockchain, we designed, developed, and deployed dif-
ferent digital contracts—to ensure the registration, validity of
chain-of-evidence preservation, node peering and their inter-
connectivity, sawtooth customized consensus verification
protocol for deliverance and active processor of transac-
tions. However, the programming interface of the Sawtooth
state transfer protocol used to retrieve the IoT-Forensics
chain-of-evidence-related objects, such as video surveillance
recordings and objects-of-interest in the incident reported
through the wireless network. Whereas the transaction pro-
cessor helps in investigation and maintain video file records
in the distributed ledger. While a set of commands such
as IoT-Forensics process, investigation, capture, examine,
analysis, preserve, and report tunes through the Sawtooth
Command Line Interface (CLI) that interacts with blockchain
hyperledger security protection and storage services.
The acyclic transaction nodes’ interconnectivity shares
complex validation and verification. Whereas the customized
consensus policies manage participating stakeholder trans-
actions, where it can initiate the request of accessing as
well as execute a transaction to the approval of update
transactions—implemented in a separate process. A trusted
transactional execution environment is designed that enables
an efficient multithreading validation processes with the
help of proof-of-work blockchain consensus. Substantially,
the proposed distributed ledger architecture provides high
security for the digital forensic investigation process in an
IoT-wireless video surveillance environment. With the strong
performance of blockchain increase the adaptation in future.
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The other features of the proposed work in the video surveil-
lance environment are discussed as follows: securing incident
investigation (identification of objects of interest), maintain-
ing chain-of-evidence confidentiality, integrity, transparency,
and availability of 24/7 with automation.
4.1 Transaction Execution and Store Distributed
Ledger of IoT-Digital Forensics Investigation
in Chain-of-custody
Through the process of storing IoT-video surveillance-
based captured suspicious activities, records are preserved in
IPFS (a distributed external blockchain hyperledger storage
file structure) for IoT-Forensics investigation and recorded
chain-of-evidence traceability. These chains of evidence
are exchanged only among the participating stakeholders
within the private permissioned network. In IoT-Forensics,
the IPFS distributed storage leverages high efficiency for
forensics video frame filtering, collaborative validation, and
point-of-object related information record storage. This stor-
age structure enables chain-of-evidence exchange, transfer,
track, and trace, and preserves large video surveillance and
digital forensics investigation-related records with domain
efficiency, as shown in Fig. 4. Moreover, the IPFS stored
transaction nodes are fully cryptographic hash (SHA-256)
encrypted, which is the direct way to preserve the distributed
ledger on the blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth with robust
security. For instance, this storage does not require any stake-
holder permit to exchange records with the selected one. With
the implementation of the IoT-Forensics node, transactions
execution and the processes of digital signature, announce-
ment, service delivery, endorsing, and verification protocols
are presented in Fig. 5.
The large amounts of video surveillance-based recorded
files are used to trigger through individual Sawtooth business
rule (digital contracts). The transaction execution proposal is
sent to the P2P connected nodes in the chain to endorse digital
contracts, they execute the endorsement, and the distributed
ledger is successfully endorsed, as shown in Fig. 5. How-
ever, a digital signature provides an acceptance mechanism to
the participating stakeholders, where they can able to accept
changes involved in the process of the chain of custody. And
so, it returns to the endorser to endorse the document and
exchange it among the stakeholders after the completion of
the endorsement process. The peering of nodes validates the
integrity of IoT-Forensics case transactions and aggregates
them onto the distributed ledger. For instance, the REST API
executes the complete running transactions delivered through
the hyperledger Sawtooth directly; through this REST API,
the IoT-Forensics chain-of-evidence investigation system can
GET (meaning current state) and POST (meaning digital con-
tract) node services in the peering private network. It also
extracted the video surveillance investigation case records
Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188 10181

Fig. 4 Blockchain hyperledger sawtooth enables novel and secure IoT-forensics investigation architecture for real-time video surveillance and
process of incident response

and the process of incident response from the various nodes

in the blockchain. The programmed ledger (contracts) of the
IoT-Forensics chain-of-evidence is stored on the Sawtooth
IPFS distributed storage.
These digital contracts are designed and implemented
(shown in digital contracts #1-#3) to create IoT-Forensics
recorded information integrity, transparency, immutability,
preservation, and provenance of the complete process of
investigation and maintain a secure exchange pathway among
participating stakeholders. This blockchain Sawtooth per-
missioned private network encrypted ledgers are immutable,
meaning they cannot be altered or manipulated, which means
there is no option for tampering or forging, and further
enhancing the tracking and traceability features of the pro- Fig. 5 The process of IoT-forensics evidence and incident response
posed architecture with security. transaction execution

4.1.1 Smart (Digital) Contract Implementation

In this proposed blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth-enabled
IoT-Forensics real-time video surveillance investigation and
the process of forensics evidence secure preservation archi-
tecture, we build a permissioned private channel in which
we restrict direct message delivery and receive transmission
capability. The reason for the restriction is that IoT-Forensics
transaction privacy and integrity between the subspaces of
network stakeholders.
The functionality of digital contracts enables IoT-
Forensics transactions and Sawtooth logic of business
to invoke specific node execution on this private dis-
tributed ledger. The digital contracts also handle the entire
consensus protocol and execution of service delivery and
digital signature in the process of transaction execution
operation on the blockchain communication network shown
in Fig. 5. We have presented three digital contracts for
IoT-Forensics video surveillance-based crime incident inves-
tigations and preserved the chain-of-evidence in a distributed,
secure, and protected blockchain ledger. The pseudo-
representations of the designed and implemented digital
contracts are as follows (Table 2 and 3):
The blockchain hyperledger Sawtooth enables IoT-
Forensics investigation contracts and a customized Sawtooth
consensus (proof-of-work) protocol for participating stake-
holders is initiate between the IoT-real time video surveil-
lance monitoring and the process of a digital forensic inves-
tigation. To register new case records of the incident captured
via surveillance cameras (including video frame filtering,
collaborative validation, and point-of-interest) and monitor
information of multimedia with the registration of participat-
ing stakeholders for this case investigation. A reg() function is

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10182 Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188

Table 2 Business Rule# 1 Table 3 Business Rule# 2

Smart (Digital) Contract #1: Stakeholders Participation (reg()) Smart (Digital) Contract #2: Blockchain-Forensics Node
Transactions (AddNode())
Input: IoT-Real Time Video Surveillance Forensics Engineer
Initialized System Address Input: IoT-Real Time Video Surveillance Forensics Engineer
Variable: int.main(): Initialized System Address
type.file[z]; Variable: int.main():
Video-based incident evidence case registration number, type.file[z];
(caseNum); track ID,
case details, (trackID);
(caseDetails); previous court of law decision,
case chain-of-custody, access (PCoLD);
(caseCOC); current decision
case decision, (current Decision)
(caseDecision); timestamp (execute);
go timestamp(execute), update records contract (UpdateNodeTrans());
IoT-Forensics Add Node Transaction Contract Address IoT-Forensics Engineer, counter (TranCounter)
(AddNode()), IoT-Forensics Engineer authorized to set add node
transactions registration; transactions addresses
(TranReg), if int.main(): type.file[z] is  IoT-Forensics Engineer
counter (TranCounter); then,
IoT-Forensics Engineer is authorized and responsible and if UpdateNodeTrans() is not Added in the digital contact
maintain a set of case transaction registration contracts; (AddNode())
if Tx.main() is   true then,
then, digital contract state will change and add new case node and
if caseNum is not the digital contact their details
then, update trackID, PCoLD, currentDecision, timestamp,
digital contract state will change and add new case node and execute,
their details and
update caseNum, caseDetails, caseCOC, caseDecision, UpdateNodeTrans();
timestamp, execute, else
and Error generate then backtrack;
AddNode(); terminate;
else else
Error generate then backtrack; Error generate then backtrack;
terminate; terminate;
else
Error generate then backtrack;
terminate; (AddNode()), respectively, shown in digital contract 3 (Table
4).

created to add and execute IoT-Forensics chain-of-evidence-
related information and is used by IoT-Forensics engineers
to record the details of stakeholders and permission them
according to the consensus protocol. Whereas the AddNode()
function is designed to add new transactions that occur dur-
ing the investigation process (including chain-of-evidence
examine, analysis, preserve, report, generation, presentation,
court trial, and settlement) and execute updated information
in the UpdateNodeTrans() contract, which updates all trans-
action history with the new AddNode() related information
and shares it among the chain stakeholders.
These contracts also record additional IoT-Forensics
related information such as update caseNum, caseDetails,
caseCOC, caseDecision, update trackID, PCoLD, current-
Decision, update assAddress, CurrentTrans, previousTrans,
calTrans, timestamp, and other activity execute steps. Fur-
thermore, the well-deployed UpdateNodeTrans() contract
exchanges its updated addresses with the other contracts
5 Operations of the Proposed IoT-Real Time
Video Surveillance Investigation
5.1 Simulations and Results
In this paper, we used the VIRAT-2020 temporal real-time
video surveillance public repository dataset/database. It is
designed to be realistic multimedia streaming, diverse scenes,
completely natural human events, and categories-based, rec-
ognized actions, and clutter background related videos. It is
a well-known benchmark dataset for artificial intelligence,
IoT, and multimedia-based communities. This dataset pro-
vides a wide range of temporal resolution, which is designed
to capture these ranges with 20–200 pixels and a frame rate
of 2–30 Hz. And so, it provides both the original video with
downsampled and high-definition quality [43].
The simulation is executed for the temporal real-time
video surveillance stream to detect suspicious activities and

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Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188 10183

Table 4 Business Rule# 3

Smart (Digital) Contract #3: Blockchain-Forensics Updated

Node Transactions (UpdateNodeTrans())

Input: IoT-Real Time Video Surveillance Forensics Engineer

Initialized System Address
Variable: int.main():
type.file[z];
assign address (assAddress);
current;
timestamp(execute),
current transaction (CurrentTrans);
previous transaction (previousTrans), IoT-Forensics Engineer
IoT-Forensics Engineer, calculate total transactions (calTrans)
IoT-Forensics Engineer authorized and responsible to set the
digital contract updates
if Tx.main() is IoT-Forensics Engineer
then,
if AddNode(), UpdateNodeTrans() is not Added in the digital
contact
then,
digital contract state will change and add new case node and
update their details
update assAddress, execute, CurrentTrans, previousTrans,
calTrans, timestamp,
and
UpdateNodeTrans();
else
Error generate then backtrack;
terminate;
else
Error generate then backtrack;
terminate;

Fig. 6 IoT-real time camera-based original video surveillance recording

crime incidents that occurred in the captured footage, as
shown in Fig. 6. And so, the outputs are examined and
analyzed through the process of a multimedia forensics inves-
tigation. Based on IoT-based video surveillance, real-time
captured data input, analysis of the individual objects in the
scene, and the output of the video presented to the suspi-
cious activities’ detection in the footage and preserved report
against the incident can be viewed, as shown in Fig. 6. This
complete procedure reduces the consumption of resources
constraints down to 11.56%.
Each frame is filtered, examined, validated, analyzed,
stored, and presented the IoT-Forensics investigation coding
in accordance with the business rule is designed, shown in
Fig. 7. On the other side, real-time streaming and video trans-
mission have also been analyzed, preserved, and reported
using secure blockchain hyperledger sawtooth-enabled pro-
cess of digital forensics investigation, which results in high-
security protection of chain-of-evidence (collected informa-
tion), hash (SH-265) encrypted IoT-Forensics node transac-
tions, and robust performance of wireless video surveillance
and transmission-related information processing.
With the development of the Blockchain Hyperledger
Sawtooth-enabled Internet of Things based real-time video
(1), convert recorded image into gray scale (2), examine and analyze
real-time scene (3), and detect the suspicious activity and register inci-
dent evidence by comparing to the preserved data
surveillance and the process of digital forensics investiga-
tion distributed architecture. In this proposed ecosystem, we
design and created platform for ledger protection, where the
encryption complexity is set to be high, and robust in the
overall process execution of dynamic investigation.
Despite this, the low processing and simplicity can affect
the system security and the quality of streaming video
surveillance forensics investigation. In this regard, the IoT-
streaming information is forwarded to the digital investi-
gation, where the defined process analysis the sequence of
video frame filtration, collaborative validation, and detects
the object shown in Fig. 8. This forensics investigation
coding is performed to obtain the IoT-streamed of video
surveillance dynamic incident response and preserve infor-
mation (chain-of-evidence) in the blockchain distributed
ledger. However, blockchain Hyperledger Sawtooth per-
missioned private network provides high integrity of the
chain-of-evidence, participating stakeholders information

123
10184
Fig. 7 Wireless camera-based video surveillance recording and digi-
tal forensics investigation, (1) input of iot-real time video surveillance
object (point-of-interest) detection frequency calculation, (2) after
forensics analysis the output of object-of-interest detection and their
frequency
confidentiality, system provenance, evidence transparency,
and immutability in stored records, as shown in Fig. 9.
Figure 9 depicts the private permissionless and without
blockchain security [43, 44]. The authors in [43] and [44]
proposed a framework for Blockchain-IoT for multimedia
surveillance and investigation using a public network mod-
ular structure, which is quite less secure for digital forensics
chain-of-evidence preservation.
Figure 10 presents the working operation of the
blockchain Hyperledger Sawtooth-enabled IoT-real time
video surveillance and process of digital forensics investiga-
tion architecture, in which we have discussed the chain-of-
evidence security, registration of participating stakeholders,
investigation process validation, and IoT-Forensics node
transaction verification. The process initiates and executes
between the participating stakeholders and the federal inves-
tigation department once the sawtooth consensus protocol
reaches the level of record reg() contract, which is used for
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Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188
Fig. 8 Calculate the IoT-real-time video surveillance frame filtering and
object analysis frequency, (1) examine and analyze the sequence of
frame filtering, collaborative validation, and object-of-intertest captured
in the video, (2) input and output of video surveillance point-of-interest
characteristics fluctuation, and (3) 3D demonstration of output features
interaction between stakeholders and digital signature with
the point of SHA-256 encryption.
The AddNode() contract is performed between the federal
investigation department and a court of law, where an IoT-
Forensics engineer manages the entire chain-of-evidence-
related transactions and tackles redundancy. Whereas the
UpdateNodeTrans() contract is performed between the Saw-
tooth validation and IoT-Forensics engineer and exchanges
updates among the stakeholders (checking if the stakeholder
is registered, then allowing access), and all this information
is stored in a distributed digital ledger.
5.2 Implementation Challenges, Issues,
and Limitations
5.2.1 Data Automation and Privacy with Smart Contracts
The blockchain-IoT is a distributed, decentralized permis-
sioned private network, where wireless video surveillance
captures and exchanges multimedia-related critical infor-
mation including the video frames filtered, collaborative
validation, and detection of objects-of-interest of the trans-
mitted IoT-wireless chain of nodes [45]. This information
is recorded and stored in the core distributed ledger elec-
tronically, where Hyperledger Sawtooth-enabled modular
architectures to allow access control of such sensitive evi-
dence to the participating stakeholders. The challenging
problem is to restrict the duplication of video frames and
their filtering, which consumes more time with high exe-
cution costs and increases the use of computational power.
Although the traditional manual analysis procedures of frame
Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188
Fig. 9 Comparison of blockchain hyperledger, (1) display the compar-
ison of blockchain-enabled IoT-forensics security with public hyper-
ledger, (2) display the comparison of blockchain-enabled iot-forensics
security with private permissioned hyperleder sawtooth
filtering, collaborative validation, and marking objects-of-
interest are tedious, they lead to apathy and utilize more time
and human effort in this newly distributed ledger technol-
ogy [46]. For instance, the problems are analyzed in a way,
that shows an increased process of automation of IoT-real-
time video surveillance and forensics investigation evidence
traceability, which is still a major challenge in the blockchain
hyperledger environment.
5.2.2 Regulatory Compliance
Various problems are associated with the existing IoT-
digital forensics investigation process and the chain of
multimedia evidence, including fault tolerance, errors in the
IoT-multimedia case investigation transactions, static inci-
dent response, and record-keeping in the manual ledger or
cloud-enabled centralized server-based storage, especially
10185
dependent on third-party preservation and security solutions
[18]. Additionally, these solutions are completely unreli-
able and inappropriate tools (unlicensed) are used for the
capture of IoT-multimedia-related information from exter-
nal portable devices and its analysis through distinct digital
forensics investigation methods [45].
5.2.3 Platform Interoperability Problem
A substantial adaptation of enterprise infrastructure across
various businesses to provide an effective and efficient solu-
tion to the users using distinct platforms, for example,
distributed ledger technology, enabled the legacy of the
system [45]. The existing legacy of IoT-video surveillance
forensics investigation procedural solutions is one of the
examples of a lack of interoperability. Weak implementa-
tion and system discontinuity can exacerbate scalability and
adoption issues [46, 47]. For instance, hyperledger tech-
nologies work on this issue, proposing a different system
for interoperability and trying to cope with this problem;
cross-chain blockchain can provide adaptability, scalabil-
ity, and interoperability solutions and efficiently overcome
these issues and maximize the interconnectivity between IoT-
multimedia environments.
5.2.4 Distributed Node Storage Challenge
In the current IoT-forensics environment, evidence chain
management is either preserved on the cloud storage or enter-
prise personal central storage leads systems compromised
[46, 47]. It is because of a lack of standardization with weak
privacy and security. Substantially, there is no proper way to
stop IoT-multimedia-related attacks and make them secure.
By enabling the feature of blockchain, which is traceability,
the main objective is to resist forgery and tampering of chain-
of-evidence throughout the process of chain-of-custody [18].
In this scenario, the use of IPFS immutable file storage
decentralized systems with the proposed IoT-blockchain
hyperledger Sawtooth modular structure alleviates these
types of challenges. In addition, blockchain technology pro-
vides real-time monitoring capability among the patients that
helps in the digital investigation in terms of video capturing,
examining, identifying, analyzing, documenting, storing,
and presenting evidence in a court of law [47]. To auto-
mate such transactions, the DApp is designed with business
rules to maintain the distributed ledger and related solutions
between nodes. It includes aiding the IoT-multimedia foren-
sics investigation authority, chain-of-evidence preservation
and custody, and in turn improving the integrity and trans-
parency of the collected chain-of-evidence.
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10186
Fig. 10 Operation of validation and verification of the proposed blockchain hyperledger sawtooth-enabled IoT-forensics architecture through
sequence diagram
6 Conclusion
This paper discusses the current challenges involved in
the IoT environment, especially in IoT with wireless sen-
sors network-based real-time video surveillance, monitor-
ing, existing examination, investigation, and security-related
problems. In this paper, the lifecycle of the existing IoT-
enabled real-time video capturing from a surveillance camera
and analyzing them dynamically is critical. It is because
examining each frame filtering, collaborative validation, and
detection of objects of interest in a multimedia environ-
ment is complex, which is the most highlighted limitation
to consider in this paper. Substantially, after the examined
and analyzed aspect of filtered objects of interest and pre-
serving all the transactions in the distributed storage as a
chain-of-custody for further digital investigation is another
challenging prospect. In addition, to prevent individual cap-
tured ledgers, the paper collaborates a digital forensics
investigation process with the proposed blockchain hyper-
ledger sawtooth architecture to securely protect the hierarchy
of lifecycle, which makes chain-of-custody privacy. And
so, this can help in the real-time investigation of suspi-
cious activities and related crimes via the activated incident
response method. Thus, it is of utmost importance to assure
and guarantee the transparency, confidentiality, integrity,
immutability, and provenance of analyzed evidence that is
collected from wireless multimedia surveillance and preserve
its chain-of-custody during IoT-cloud crime investigation.
We proposed IoT-Blockchain video surveillance dis-
tributed architecture for multimedia forensics technology.
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Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188
A proposed blockchain-enabled digital forensics investiga-
tion ecosystem is deployed to bring tamper resistance to
the evidence. The use of Hyperledger Sawtooth enables
evidence-related participating stakeholders to register and
request, access, and record IoT-wireless video surveillance-
related node transactions through the Blockchain Sawtooth
distributed application (DApp) on the distributed ledger. And
so, Hyperledger Sawtooth is a permissioned private net-
work that provides a modular framework that separates the
core domain from the application system. By using this,
we designed and implemented digital contracts (business
rules) and accomplished the customized consensus policy
(managing who can access/read and write in the forensics
chain-of-custody) for core domain fault tolerance to simulate
a trustworthiness execution environment for the protected
evidence. We discussed the IoT-blockchain implementation
issues and limitations of the proposed wireless real-time
video surveillance and monitoring via the process of a digital
forensic investigation.
Acknowledgements I would like to thank Prof. Dr. Aftab Ahmed
Shaikh (Dean Faculty of Information Technology/Chairman), Depart-
ment of Computer Science, Sindh Madressatul Islam University 74000,
Karachi, and Dr. Asif Ali Laghari (Assistant Professor), Department of
Computer Science, Sindh Madressatul Islam University 74000, Karachi
for their supervision, continuous help, motivation, support, and guided
me with this dissertation. They allowed me to work on this disserta-
tion topic. Along with this, I would also like to thank my departmental
professors (teachers) wholeheartedly. This Ph.D. research is dedicated
to my mentors at Sindh Madressatul Islam University 74000, Karachi,
under whose constant motivation and guidance I have been able to
complete this dissertation. In fact, they not only enlightened me with
the academic knowledge but also gave me valuable advice whenever I
needed it the most.
Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering (2023) 48:10173–10188
Author Contributions AAK has written original draft, organization,
preparation, and performed part of the literature survey, edited, design
modular architecture, explored the software tools, with rewrote the
draft after reviewed. AAS (Supervisor) and AAL (Co-Supervisor) have
reviewed, suggested, and recommended a sort of improvements in this
paper. All the authors of this paper read and agreed to the online version
of the published article.
Declarations
Conflict of interest The authors declare no conflict of interest.
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