Cooperative sensing of spectrum opportunities

Reliability and availability of sensing information gathered from local spectrum sensing (LSS) by a single Cognitive Radio is strongly affected by the propagation conditions, period of sensing, and geographical position of the device. For this reason, cooperative spectrum sensing (CSS) was largely proposed in order to improve LSS performance by using cooperation between Secondary Users (SUs). The goal of this chapter is to provide a general analysis on CSS for cognitive radio networks (CRNs). Firstly, the theoretical system model for centralized CSS is introduced, together with a preliminary discussion on several fusion rules and operative modes. Moreover, three main aspects of CSS that substantially differentiate the theoretical model from realistic application scenarios are analyzed: (i) the presence of spatiotemporal correlation between decisions by different SUs; (ii) the possible mobility of SUs; and (iii) the nonideality of the control channel between the SUs and the Fusion Center (FC). For each aspect, a possible practical solution for network organization is presented, showing that, in particular for the first two aspects, cluster-based CSS, in which sensing SUs are properly chosen, could mitigate the impact of such realistic assumptions

Mobility-Aware, Correlation-Based Node Grouping and Selection for Cooperative Spectrum Sensing, Journal of Telecommunications and Information Technology, 2014, nr 2

Cooperative spectrum sensing has been proposed as a solution to increase the sensing function accuracy in cognitive radio networks, but the research has, so far, mainly focused on static scenarios, all but neglecting the impact of mobility on spectrum sensing. In this work a novel cooperative spectrum sensing scheme for mobile cognitive networks, based on a correlation-based, mobility-aware node selection algorithm is proposed. Correlation among sensing decisions is used to divide nodes into groups, and mobility is taken into account in the group leaders selection by means of a node selection metric that considers both sensing performance and mobility. Performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated by computer simulations taking into account mobility and a detailed modeling of temporal and spatial correlation of fading and shadowing components in the channel path loss, going way beyond the performance evaluation carried out in previous works on correlation-based cooperative sensing schemes. Simulation results highlight that the proposed metric leads to a signi cant increase of the update period required to maintain acceptable sensing performance, and correspondingly to a strong reduction in the overhead caused by the grouping and node selection procedure

Spectrum sharing security and attacks in CRNs: a review

Cognitive Radio plays a major part in communication technology by resolving the shortage of the spectrum through usage of dynamic spectrum access and artificial intelligence characteristics. The element of spectrum sharing in cognitive radio is a fundament al approach in utilising free channels. Cooperatively communicating cognitive radio devices use the common control channel of the cognitive radio medium access control to achieve spectrum sharing. Thus, the common control channel and consequently spectrum sharing security are vital to ensuring security in the subsequent data communication among cognitive radio nodes. In addition to well known security problems in wireless networks, cognitive radio networks introduce new classes of security threats and challenges, such as licensed user emulation attacks in spectrum sensing and misbehaviours in the common control channel transactions, which degrade the overall network operation and performance. This review paper briefly presents the known threats and attacks in wireless networks before it looks into the concept of cognitive radio and its main functionality. The paper then mainly focuses on spectrum sharing security and its related challenges. Since spectrum sharing is enabled through usage of the common control channel, more attention is paid to the security of the common control channel by looking into its security threats as well as protection and detection mechanisms. Finally, the pros and cons as well as the comparisons of different CR - specific security mechanisms are presented with some open research issues and challenges