The widespread adoption of the Internet of Things (IoT) has revolutionized various sectors, including healthcare and transportation, by facilitating extensive data gathering and the provision of advanced, intelligent services. However, this growth also amplifies the risks of privacy breaches, unauthorized access, and resource exhaustion, particularly in constrained devices that cannot afford heavy cryptographic operations. Existing solutions often compromise between efficiency and security, leaving systems exposed to replay, Man-in-the-Middle, and even quantum-era threats. This paper proposes a novel authentication and privacy-preserving framework tailored for resource-constrained IoT enviro... More >