The use of one-way chains in authentication protocols is a technique of great importance which has many applications. Employing cryptographic techniques in the area of industrial control systems has gained significant interest in the last few years. This paper proposes the use of a one-way chain based authentication protocol in a robust control system. Some enhancements of a generic one-way chain based authentication protocol are required by the scenario of secure robust and they are intended for achieving lower authentication delays and computational costs while preserving the control robust in the presence of potential attackers. We also underline that the techniques described in this paper are not restricted to the subject of authentication in robust control systems since the presented protocols may be useful for other applications as well.