Network management for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) is challenging, keeping in view the high mobility of the vehicles. Hence, for smooth execution of various operations such as rescue, surveillance, and crowdsensing in a UAV environment, softwarization of UAV networks becomes essential, which separates control functions from hardware, i.e., data from the control plane. Using softwarization, various complex operations in the UAV environment can be executed with an increase in UAVs. However, with an increase in the complexity of UAV network management, secure communication among UAVs becomes a tedious task as most of the communication among UAVs takes place using an open network, i.e., the Internet. Software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) are the key softwarization enabling techniques in fifth-generation (5G) networks, which are used to manage secure network services with reduced capital and operating expenditures. However, different softwarization layers may suffer from controller hijacking, user authentication, access control, and resource consumption attack. Many solutions reported in the literature for this problem are centralized controlled that suffers from single-point of failure and also prone to various security attacks. Motivated from this, in this paper, a systematic and comprehensive survey is presented, which is based on blockchain (BC)-envisioned secure and trusted softwarized UAV network management. We also propose a BC-based softwarized UAV architecture to make the communication network secure and easily manageable. It can offer flexible and dynamic decision capabilities for network management services even in open 5G-enabled UAV networks. Finally, we analyzed the research challenges posed and future challenges in this area.

考虑到飞行器的高度机动性，无人飞行器（UAV）的网络管理具有挑战性。因此，为了在UAV环境中顺利执行各种操作，例如救援，监视和群众感知，UAV网络的软化变得必不可少，这将控制功能与硬件（即来自控制平面的数据）分开。使用软化，随着无人机的增加，可以在无人机环境中执行各种复杂的操作。然而，随着UAV网络管理的复杂性的增加，UAV之间的安全通信成为繁琐的任务，因为UAV之间的大多数通信是使用开放网络（即，因特网）进行的。软件定义网络（SDN）和网络功能虚拟化（NFV）是第五代（5G）网络中的关键软化启用技术，用于以降低的资金和运营支出来管理安全的网络服务。但是，不同的软化层可能会遭受控制器劫持，用户身份验证，访问控制和资源消耗攻击。文献中针对该问题报告的许多解决方案都是集中控制的，遭受单点故障的困扰，并且还容易受到各种安全攻击。为此，本文提出了一种基于区块链（BC）设想的安全和受信任的软化无人机网络管理的系统，全面的调查。我们还提出了一种基于BC的软化无人机架构，以使通信网络安全且易于管理。它甚至可以在启用5G的开放式无人机网络中为网络管理服务提供灵活而动态的决策功能。最后，我们分析了该领域的研究挑战和未来挑战。