Alibi framework for identifying reactive jamming nodes in wireless LAN

Reactive jamming nodes are the nodes of the network that get compromised and become the source of jamming attacks. They assume to know any shared secrets and protocols used in the networks. Thus, they can jam very effectively and are very stealthy. We propose a novel approach to identifying the reactive jamming nodes in wireless LAN (WLAN). We rely on the half-duplex nature of nodes: they cannot transmit and receive at the same time. Thus, if a compromised node jams a packet, it cannot guess the content of the jammed packet. More importantly, if an honest node receives a jammed packet, it can prove that it cannot be the one jamming the packet by showing the content of the packet. Such proofs of jammed packets are called "alibis" - the key concept of our approach. In this paper, we present an alibi framework to deal with reactive jamming nodes in WLAN. We propose a concept of alibi-safe topologies on which our proposed identification algorithms are proved to correctly identify the attackers. We further propose a realistic protocol to implement the identification algorithm. The protocol includes a BBC-based timing channel for information exchange under the jamming situation and a similarity hashing technique to reduce the storage and network overhead. The framework is evaluated in a realistic TOSSIM simulation where the simulation characteristics and parameters are based on real traces on our small-scale MICAz test-bed. The results show that in reasonable dense networks, the alibi framework can accurately identify both non-colluding and colluding reactive jamming nodes. Therefore, the alibi approach is a very promising approach to deal with reactive jamming nodes.published or submitted for publicationnot peer reviewe

A Survey on Wireless Security: Technical Challenges, Recent Advances and Future Trends

This paper examines the security vulnerabilities and threats imposed by the inherent open nature of wireless communications and to devise efficient defense mechanisms for improving the wireless network security. We first summarize the security requirements of wireless networks, including their authenticity, confidentiality, integrity and availability issues. Next, a comprehensive overview of security attacks encountered in wireless networks is presented in view of the network protocol architecture, where the potential security threats are discussed at each protocol layer. We also provide a survey of the existing security protocols and algorithms that are adopted in the existing wireless network standards, such as the Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, WiMAX, and the long-term evolution (LTE) systems. Then, we discuss the state-of-the-art in physical-layer security, which is an emerging technique of securing the open communications environment against eavesdropping attacks at the physical layer. We also introduce the family of various jamming attacks and their counter-measures, including the constant jammer, intermittent jammer, reactive jammer, adaptive jammer and intelligent jammer. Additionally, we discuss the integration of physical-layer security into existing authentication and cryptography mechanisms for further securing wireless networks. Finally, some technical challenges which remain unresolved at the time of writing are summarized and the future trends in wireless security are discussed.Comment: 36 pages. Accepted to Appear in Proceedings of the IEEE, 201

On the Security of the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast Protocol

Automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) is the communications protocol currently being rolled out as part of next generation air transportation systems. As the heart of modern air traffic control, it will play an essential role in the protection of two billion passengers per year, besides being crucial to many other interest groups in aviation. The inherent lack of security measures in the ADS-B protocol has long been a topic in both the aviation circles and in the academic community. Due to recently published proof-of-concept attacks, the topic is becoming ever more pressing, especially with the deadline for mandatory implementation in most airspaces fast approaching. This survey first summarizes the attacks and problems that have been reported in relation to ADS-B security. Thereafter, it surveys both the theoretical and practical efforts which have been previously conducted concerning these issues, including possible countermeasures. In addition, the survey seeks to go beyond the current state of the art and gives a detailed assessment of security measures which have been developed more generally for related wireless networks such as sensor networks and vehicular ad hoc networks, including a taxonomy of all considered approaches.Comment: Survey, 22 Pages, 21 Figure

Wi-Fi Denial of Service Attack on Wired Analog RF Channel Emulator

This report presents the design and implementation of an analog wireless channel emulator to examine various denial of service attacks in multiple mobile scenarios. The scenarios emulated in this project involve three node topologies of wireless interferers (Wi-Fi radios), including a software defined radio that transmits one of three denial of service (DoS) waveforms. The testbed was functional and met the original specifications. Results from mobile experiments show a clear distinction in performance among the three DoS waveforms depending on the node topology; a digital waveform using binary phase shift keying (BPSK) is most effective at reducing total network throughput at close range while sweep waveforms exhibit minor throughput reduction from a greater distance

Maximize resource utilization based channel access model with presence of reactive jammer for underwater wireless sensor network

Underwater sensor networks (UWSNs) are vulnerable to jamming attacks. Especially, reactive jamming which emerged as a greatest security threat to UWSNs. Reactive jammer are difficult to be removed, defended and identified. Since reactive jammer can control and regulate (i.e., the duration of the jam signal) the probability of jamming for maintaining high vulnerability with low detection probability. The existing model are generally designed considering terrestrial wireless sensor networks (TWSNs). Further, these models are limited in their ability to detect jamming correctly, distinguish between the corrupted and uncorrupted parts of a packet, and be adaptive with the dynamic environment. Cooperative jamming model has presented in recent times to utilize resource efficiently. However, very limited work is carried out using cooperative jamming detection. For overcoming research challenges, this work present Maximize Resource Utilization based Channel Access (MRUCA). The MRUCA uses cross layer design for mitigating reactive jammer (i.e., MRUCA jointly optimizes the cooperative hopping probabilities and channel accessibility probabilities of authenticated sensor device). Along with channel, load capacity of authenticated sensor device is estimated to utilize (maximize) resource efficiently. Experiment outcome shows the proposed MRUCA model attain superior performance than state-of-art model in terms of packet transmission, BER and Detection rate

Security Improvements for the S-MIM Asynchronous Return Link

S-MIM is a hybrid terrestrial and satellite system that enables efficient and high-performance communication in the return link. For communication to be possible between a device and the satellite, a preamble has to be established. Some parameters to generate the preamble are broadcasted by the satellite without protection. It is very important to protect the preamble, because if an attacker knows the preamble he could avoid the communication. This project presents a method without the necessity of establishing the preamble in a way that ensures the communication. However, to achieve this security the trade-off is degradation of throughput and a delay in communication