Header compression is one of the technologies, which enables packet-switched computer networks to operate with higher efficiency even if the underlying physical link is limited. Since its inception, the compression was meant to improve dial-up Telnet connections, and has evolved into a complex multi-faceted compression library, which has been integrated into the third and fourth generation of cellular networks, among others. Beyond the promised benefit of decreased bandwidth usage, header compression has shown that it is capable of improving the quality of already existing services, such as real-time audio calls, and is a developing hot topic to this day, realising, for example, Internet Protocol (IP) version 6 support on resource constrained low-power devices. However, header compression is ill equipped to handle the stringent requirements and challenges, which are posed by the coming fifth generation of wireless and cellular networks (5G) and its applications. Even though it can be considered as an already well developed area of computer networks that can compress protocol headers with unparalleled efficiency, header compression is still operating under some assumptions and restrictions that could deny its employment outside of cellular Voice over IP transmissions to certain degrees. Albeit some improvements in the latency domain could be achieved with its help, the application of header compression in both largely interconnected networks and very dynamic ones – such as the wireless mesh and vehicular networks – is not yet assured, as the topic, in this perspective, is still relatively new and unexplored. The main goal of my theses is the presentation and evaluation of novel ideas, which support the application of header compression concepts for the future wireless use-cases, as it holds alluring benefits for the coming network generations, if applied correctly. The dissertation provides a detailed treatment of my contribution in the specific research areas of header compression and network coding, which encompass novel proposals for their enhancement in 5G uses, such as broadcastability and online optimisation, as well as their subsequent analysis from various perspectives, including the achievable compression gains, delay reduction, transmission efficiency, and energy consumption, to name a few. Besides the focus on enabling header compression in 5G, the development of traffic-agnostic and various network-coded compression concepts are also introduced to attain the benefits of both techniques at the same time, namely, reduced bandwidth usage and high reliability in latency sensitive heterogeneous and error prone mesh networks. The generalisation of compression is achieved by the employment of various machine learning concepts, which could approximate the compression characteristics of any packet-based communication flow, while network coding facilitates the exploitation of the low-latency benefits of error correcting codes in heavily interconnected wireless networks.

Internet of Things (IoT) is an ecosystem comprises CT (Communication Technology),IT (Information Technology) and sometime OT (Operational Technologies) wheredifferent machines and devices can interact with each other and exchange useful datawhich can be processed using different IoT applications to take decisions and performrequired actions. Number of IoT devices and IoT networks are growing exponentially.Security is of utmost importance and without proper security implementation, IoTNetworks with billions of devices will be hacked and used as botnets which can createdisaster. The new IoT use cases cannot be realized using the current communicationtechnologies due to the QoS (Quality of Service) and business requirements. 5Gnetwork are designed keeping IoT use cases in mind and with the development of 5Gnetwork, it will be easier to implement more secured IoT network and enable differentIoT use cases which are not feasible today.To build the future IoT networks with 5G, it’s important to study and understand 5Gsecurity features. Security is perceived as one of the most important considerationwhile building IoT solutions and to implement 5G network for IoT solutions require anoverall understanding of 5G security features. In the thesis, work have been done toidentify the gap in the current research with respect to 5G security features anddescribe 5G features that will enhance IoT security. After identifying key 5G securityfeatures, the implementation of the identified 5G security features will be describedwith the 5G based smart grid and smart factory use cases. The key finding is howdifferent 5G security capabilities secure IoT communication and another importantfinding is that not all security capabilities are applicable to all IoT use cases. Hence,security capabilities to be used based on the 5G use case requirement.