Masquerading Techniques in IEEE 802.11 Wireless Local Area Networks

The airborne nature of wireless transmission offers a potential target for attackers to compromise IEEE 802.11 Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN). In this dissertation, we explore the current WLAN security threats and their corresponding defense solutions. In our study, we divide WLAN vulnerabilities into two aspects, client, and administrator. The client-side vulnerability investigation is based on examining the Evil Twin Attack (ETA) while our administrator side research targets Wi-Fi Protected Access II (WPA2). Three novel techniques have been presented to detect ETA. The detection methods are based on (1) creating a secure connection to a remote server to detect the change of gateway\u27s public IP address by switching from one Access Point (AP) to another. (2) Monitoring multiple Wi-Fi channels in a random order looking for specific data packets sent by the remote server. (3) Merging the previous solutions into one universal ETA detection method using Virtual Wireless Clients (VWCs). On the other hand, we present a new vulnerability that allows an attacker to force the victim\u27s smartphone to consume data through the cellular network by starting the data download on the victim\u27s cell phone without the victim\u27s permission. A new scheme has been developed to speed up the active dictionary attack intensity on WPA2 based on two novel ideas. First, the scheme connects multiple VWCs to the AP at the same time-each VWC has its own spoofed MAC address. Second, each of the VWCs could try many passphrases using single wireless session. Furthermore, we present a new technique to avoid bandwidth limitation imposed by Wi-Fi hotspots. The proposed method creates multiple VWCs to access the WLAN. The combination of the individual bandwidth of each VWC results in an increase of the total bandwidth gained by the attacker. All proposal techniques have been implemented and evaluated in real-life scenarios

Energy Information Systems: From the Basement to the Boardroom

A significant buildings energy reduction opportunity exists in the office sector, given that this market segment typically is an early adopter of new technology. There is a rising trend towards smart and connected offices through the internet of things (IoT) that provides new opportunities for operational efficiency and environmental sustainability practices. Leading commercial real estate companies have begun to shift from individual building automation systems (BAS) to partially integrated and automated systems such as energy information systems (EIS). In both the United States and India, organizations are seeking operational excellence, enhanced tenant relationships, and topline growth. Hence it is imperative to engage the executives with decision-making power, by tapping into their interest in sustainability, corporate social responsibility, and innovation. This expansion of interest can enable data-driven decisions, strong energy investments, and deeper energy benefits, and would drive innovation in this field. However, none of this would be possible without robust, consistent building energy information to provide visibility across all the levels of decision making, i.e. from the basement where the facilities staff take operational action to the boardroom where the executives make investment decisions. Price, security, and ease of use remain barriers to the adoption and pervasive use of promising EIS technologies in commercial office buildings. We believe that these barriers can be addressed through the development of ready, simplified, consistent, commercially available, low-cost EIS-in-a-box packages, that have a pre-defined set of hardware components and software features and functionality that are pertinent to a particular building sector. These simplified, sector-specific EIS packages can help to obviate the need for customization, and enhance ease of use, thereby enabling scale-up, in order to facilitate building energy savings. The EIS-in-a-box are adaptable in both U.S. and Indian office buildings, and potentially beyond these two countries

IEEE 802.11ax: challenges and requirements for future high efficiency wifi

The popularity of IEEE 802.11 based wireless local area networks (WLANs) has increased significantly in recent years because of their ability to provide increased mobility, flexibility, and ease of use, with reduced cost of installation and maintenance. This has resulted in massive WLAN deployment in geographically limited environments that encompass multiple overlapping basic service sets (OBSSs). In this article, we introduce IEEE 802.11ax, a new standard being developed by the IEEE 802.11 Working Group, which will enable efficient usage of spectrum along with an enhanced user experience. We expose advanced technological enhancements proposed to improve the efficiency within high density WLAN networks and explore the key challenges to the upcoming amendment.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Building Programmable Wireless Networks: An Architectural Survey

In recent times, there have been a lot of efforts for improving the ossified Internet architecture in a bid to sustain unstinted growth and innovation. A major reason for the perceived architectural ossification is the lack of ability to program the network as a system. This situation has resulted partly from historical decisions in the original Internet design which emphasized decentralized network operations through co-located data and control planes on each network device. The situation for wireless networks is no different resulting in a lot of complexity and a plethora of largely incompatible wireless technologies. The emergence of "programmable wireless networks", that allow greater flexibility, ease of management and configurability, is a step in the right direction to overcome the aforementioned shortcomings of the wireless networks. In this paper, we provide a broad overview of the architectures proposed in literature for building programmable wireless networks focusing primarily on three popular techniques, i.e., software defined networks, cognitive radio networks, and virtualized networks. This survey is a self-contained tutorial on these techniques and its applications. We also discuss the opportunities and challenges in building next-generation programmable wireless networks and identify open research issues and future research directions.Comment: 19 page

Synergizing Roadway Infrastructure Investment with Digital Infrastructure for Infrastructure-Based Connected Vehicle Applications: Review of Current Status and Future Directions

The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link.The safety, mobility, environmental and economic benefits of Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs) are potentially dramatic. However, realization of these benefits largely hinges on the timely upgrading of the existing transportation system. CAVs must be enabled to send and receive data to and from other vehicles and drivers (V2V communication) and to and from infrastructure (V2I communication). Further, infrastructure and the transportation agencies that manage it must be able to collect, process, distribute and archive these data quickly, reliably, and securely. This paper focuses on current digital roadway infrastructure initiatives and highlights the importance of including digital infrastructure investment alongside more traditional infrastructure investment to keep up with the auto industry's push towards this real time communication and data processing capability. Agencies responsible for transportation infrastructure construction and management must collaborate, establishing national and international platforms to guide the planning, deployment and management of digital infrastructure in their jurisdictions. This will help create standardized interoperable national and international systems so that CAV technology is not deployed in a haphazard and uncoordinated manner