A Survey on Wireless Sensor Network Security

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have recently attracted a lot of interest in the research community due their wide range of applications. Due to distributed nature of these networks and their deployment in remote areas, these networks are vulnerable to numerous security threats that can adversely affect their proper functioning. This problem is more critical if the network is deployed for some mission-critical applications such as in a tactical battlefield. Random failure of nodes is also very likely in real-life deployment scenarios. Due to resource constraints in the sensor nodes, traditional security mechanisms with large overhead of computation and communication are infeasible in WSNs. Security in sensor networks is, therefore, a particularly challenging task. This paper discusses the current state of the art in security mechanisms for WSNs. Various types of attacks are discussed and their countermeasures presented. A brief discussion on the future direction of research in WSN security is also included.Comment: 24 pages, 4 figures, 2 table

Reliable routing scheme for indoor sensor networks

Indoor Wireless sensor networks require a highly dynamic, adaptive routing scheme to deal with the high rate of topology changes due to fading of indoor wireless channels. Besides that, energy consumption rate needs to be consistently distributed among sensor nodes and efficient utilization of battery power is essential. If only the link reliability metric is considered in the routing scheme, it may create long hops routes, and the high quality paths will be frequently used. This leads to shorter lifetime of such paths; thereby the entire network's lifetime will be significantly minimized. This paper briefly presents a reliable load-balanced routing (RLBR) scheme for indoor ad hoc wireless sensor networks, which integrates routing information from different layers. The proposed scheme aims to redistribute the relaying workload and the energy usage among relay sensor nodes to achieve balanced energy dissipation; thereby maximizing the functional network lifetime. RLBR scheme was tested and benchmarked against the TinyOS-2.x implementation of MintRoute on an indoor testbed comprising 20 Mica2 motes and low power listening (LPL) link layer provided by CC1000 radio. RLBR scheme consumes less energy for communications while reducing topology repair latency and achieves better connectivity and communication reliability in terms of end-to-end packets delivery performance

Energy Efficient Downstream Communication in Wireless Sensor Networks

This dissertation studies the problem of energy efficient downstream communication in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). First, we present the Opportunistic Source Routing (OSR), a scalable, reliable, and energy-efficient downward routing protocol for individual node actuation in data collection WSNs. OSR introduces opportunistic routing into traditional source routing based on the parent set of a node’s upward routing in data collection, significantly addressing the drastic link dynamics in low-power and lossy WSNs. We devise a novel adaptive Bloom filter mechanism to effectively and efficiently encode a downward source-route in OSR, which enables a significant reduction of the length of source-route field in the packet header. OSR is scalable to very large-size WSN deployments, since each resource-constrained node in the network stores only the set of its direct children. The probabilistic nature of the Bloom filter passively explores opportunistic routing. Upon a delivery failure at any hop along the downward path, OSR actively performs opportunistic routing to bypass the obsolete/bad link. The evaluations in both simulations and real-world testbed experiments demonstrate that OSR significantly outperforms the existing approaches in scalability, reliability, and energy efficiency. Secondly, we propose a mobile code dissemination tool for heterogeneous WSN deployments operating on low power links. The evaluation in lab experiment and a real world WSN testbed shows how our tool reduces the laborious work to reprogram nodes for updating the application. Finally, we present an empirical study of the network dynamics of an out-door heterogeneous WSN deployment and devise a benchmark data suite. The network dynamics analysis includes link level characteristics, topological characteristics, and temporal characteristics. The unique features of the benchmark data suite include the full path information and our approach to fill the missing paths based on the principle of the routing protocol

INTERMITTENTLY CONNECTED DELAY-TOLERANT WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS

Intermittently Connected Delay-Tolerant Wireless Sensor Networks (ICDT-WSNs), a branch of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), have features of WSNs and the intermittent connectivity of Opportunistic Networks. The applications of ICDT-WSNs are increasing in recent years; however, the communication protocols suitable for this category of networks often fall short. Most of the existing communication protocols are designed for either WSNs or Opportunistic Networks with sufficient resources and tend to be inadequate for direct use in ICDT-WSNs. In this dissertation, we study ICDT-WSNs from the perspective of the characteristics, chal- lenges and possible solutions. A high-level overview of ICDT-WSNs is given, followed by a study of existing work and our solutions to address the problems of routing, flow control, error control, and storage management. The proposed solutions utilize the utility level of nodes and the connectedness of a network. In addition to the protocols for information transmissions to specific destinations, we also propose efficient mechanisms for information dissemination to arbitrary destinations. The study shows that our proposed solutions can achieve better performance than other state of the art communication protocols without sacrificing energy efficiency

Network coding-aided MAC protocols for cooperative wireless networks

The introduction of third generation (3G) technologies has caused a vast proliferation of wireless devices and networks, generating an increasing demand for high level Quality of Service (QoS). The wide spread of mobile applications has further reinforced the user need for communication, motivating at the same time the concepts of user cooperation and data dissemination. However, this trend towards continuous exchange of information and ubiquitous connectivity is inherently restricted by the energy-greedy functionalities of high-end devices. These limitations, along with the pressure exerted on the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) industry towards energy awareness, have induced the design of novel energy efficient schemes and algorithms. In this context, the Medium Access Control (MAC) layer plays a key role, since it is mainly responsible for the channel access regulation, the transmission scheduling and the resource allocation, thus constituting an appropriate point to effectively address energy efficiency issues that arise due to the users overcrowding. This dissertation provides a contribution to the design, analysis and evaluation of novel MAC protocols for cooperative wireless networks. In our attempt to design energy efficient MAC schemes, we were extensively assisted by the introduction of new techniques, such as Network Coding (NC), that intrinsically bring considerable gains in system performance. The main thesis contributions are divided into two parts. The first part presents NCCARQ, a novel NC-aided Cooperative Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ) MAC protocol for wireless networks. NCCARQ introduces a new access paradigm for cooperative ARQ schemes, exploiting NC benefits in bidirectional communication among wireless users. The NCCARQ performance in terms of QoS and energy efficiency is assessed by means of analytical probabilistic models and extensive computer-based simulations, revealing the significant gains we can achieve compared to standardized MAC solutions. In addition, the impact of realistic wireless channel conditions on the MAC protocol operation further motivated us to study the NCCARQ performance in wireless links affected by correlated shadowing, showing that the channel correlation may adversely affect the distributed cooperation benefits. The second part of the thesis is dedicated to the investigation of MAC issues in wireless data dissemination scenarios. In particular, the existence of multiple source nodes in such scenarios generates conflicting situations, considering the selfish behavior of the wireless devices that want to maximize their battery lifetime. Bearing in mind the energy efficiency importance, we propose game theoretic medium access strategies, applying energy-based utility functions which inherently imply energy awareness. In addition, Random Linear NC (RLNC) techniques are adopted to eliminate the need of exchanging excessive control packets, while Analog NC (ANC) is employed to efface the impact of collisions throughout the communication. During the elaboration of this thesis, two general key conclusions have been extracted. First, there is a fundamental requirement for implementation of new MAC protocols in order to effectively deal with state-of-the-art techniques (e.g., NC), recently introduced to enhance both the performance and the energy efficiency of the network. Second, we highlight the importance of designing novel energy efficient MAC protocols, taking into account that traditional approaches - designed mainly to assist the collision avoidance in wireless networks - tend to be obsolete.La presente tesis doctoral contribuye al diseño, análisis y evaluación de nuevos protocolos MAC cooperativos para redes inalámbricas. La introducción de nuevas técnicas, tales como la codificación de red (NC), que intrínsecamente llevan un considerable aumento en el rendimiento del sistema, nos ayudó ampliamente durante el diseño de protocolos MAC energéticamente eficientes. Las principales contribuciones de esta tesis se dividen en dos partes. La primera parte presenta el NCCARQ, un protocolo cooperativo de retransmisión automática (ARQ), asistido por NC para redes inalámbricas. La segunda parte de la tesis se centra en el diseño de protocolos de capa MAC en escenarios inalámbricos de difusión de datos. Teniendo en cuenta la importancia de la eficiencia energética, se proponen técnicas de acceso al medio basadas en teoría de juegos dónde las funciones objetivo están motivadas por el consumo energético. Las soluciones propuestas son evaluadas por medio de modelos analíticos y simulaciones por ordenador

Broadcasting and transmission coordination for ad hoc and sensor networks

This thesis studies the performance benefit of coordination in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and ad hoc networks (AHNs). WSNs are often comprised of a large number of inexpensive nodes with short battery life and limited communication and processing capabilities. AHNs are wireless networks operating without the benefits of network infrastructure (basestations) or centralized control. WSNs often require control messages be broadcast to the entire network. We study the performance of a class of randomized broadcast protocols that employ coordination to reduce the transmission of redundant messages and to reduce the occurrence of message collisions. Specifically, information coordination entails a potential transmitter employ local information to infer whether or not its potential receivers would be interested in its message, while communication coordination entails a potential transmitter employ local information to infer whether or not its transmission would interrupt other ongoing transmissions. The individual and joint benefits of these two forms of coordination are assessed through their impact on a variety of natural performance indicators.AHNs working with limited spectrum perform best when simultaneous transmissions are coordinated to avoid collisions. Optimal transmission coordination is a combinatorial optimization problem that is, in general, intractable for large size networks, even with global information and central control. Constraints on simultaneous transmissions may arise from both transceiver limitations (e.g., half-duplex designs) and from requirements on the signal to interference ratio. We study the transmission coordination optimization problem under a variety of natural communication constraints. Our work identifies particular instances where the problem may be solved by greedy algorithms, and studies the performance of several natural heuristic solutions.Ph.D., Computer Engineering -- Drexel University, 200

Real-Time Cross-Layer Routing Protocol for Ad Hoc Wireless Sensor Networks

Reliable and energy efficient routing is a critical issue in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) deployments. Many approaches have been proposed for WSN routing, but sensor field implementations, compared to computer simulations and fully-controlled testbeds, tend to be lacking in the literature and not fully documented. Typically, WSNs provide the ability to gather information cheaply, accurately and reliably over both small and vast physical regions. Unlike other large data network forms, where the ultimate input/output interface is a human being, WSNs are about collecting data from unattended physical environments. Although WSNs are being studied on a global scale, the major current research is still focusing on simulations experiments. In particular for sensor networks, which have to deal with very stringent resource limitations and that are exposed to severe physical conditions, real experiments with real applications are essential. In addition, the effectiveness of simulation studies is severely limited in terms of the difficulty in modeling the complexities of the radio environment, power consumption on sensor devices, and the interactions between the physical, network and application layers. The routing problem in ad hoc WSNs is nontrivial issue because of sensor node failures due to restricted recourses. Thus, the routing protocols of WSNs encounter two conflicting issue: on the one hand, in order to optimise routes, frequent topology updates are required, while on the other hand, frequent topology updates result in imbalanced energy dissipation and higher message overhead. In the literature, such as in (Rahul et al., 2002), (Woo et al., 2003), (TinyOS, 2004), (Gnawali et al., 2009) and (Burri et al., 2007) several authors have presented routing algorithms for WSNs that consider purely one or two metrics at most in attempting to optimise routes while attempting to keep small message overhead and balanced energy dissipation. Recent studies on energy efficient routing in multihop WSNs have shown a great reliance on radio link quality in the path selection process. If sensor nodes along the routing path and closer to the base station advertise a high quality link to forwarding upstream packets, these sensor nodes will experience a faster depletion rate in their residual energy. This results in a topological routing hole or network partitioning as stated and resolved in and (Daabaj 2010). This chapter presents an empirical study on how to improve energy efficiency for reliable multihop communication by developing a real-time cross-layer lifetime-oriented routing protocol and integrating useful routing information from different layers to examine their joint benefit on the lifetime of individual sensor nodes and the entire sensor network. The proposed approach aims to balance the workload and energy usage among relay nodes to achieve balanced energy dissipation, thereby maximizing the functional network lifetime. The obtained experimental results are presented from prototype real-network experiments based on Crossbow’s sensor motes (Crossbow, 2010), i.e., Mica2 low-power wireless sensor platforms (Crossbow, 2010). The distributed real-time routing protocol which is proposed In this chapter aims to face the dynamics of the real world sensor networks and also to discover multiple paths between the base station and source sensor nodes. The proposed routing protocol is compared experimentally with a reliability-oriented collection-tree protocol, i.e., the TinyOS MintRoute protocol (Woo et al., 2003). The experimental results show that our proposed protocol has a higher node energy efficiency, lower control overhead, and fair average delay