Securing Handover in Wireless IP Networks

In wireless and mobile networks, handover is a complex process that involves multiple layers of protocol and security executions. With the growing popularity of real time communication services such as Voice of IP, a great challenge faced by handover nowadays comes from the impact of security implementations that can cause performance degradation especially for mobile devices with limited resources. Given the existing networks with heterogeneous wireless access technologies, one essential research question that needs be addressed is how to achieve a balance between security and performance during the handover. The variations of security policy and agreement among different services and network vendors make the topic challenging even more, due to the involvement of commercial and social factors. In order to understand the problems and challenges in this field, we study the properties of handover as well as state of the art security schemes to assist handover in wireless IP networks. Based on our analysis, we define a two-phase model to identify the key procedures of handover security in wireless and mobile networks. Through the model we analyze the performance impact from existing security schemes in terms of handover completion time, throughput, and Quality of Services (QoS). As our endeavor of seeking a balance between handover security and performance, we propose the local administrative domain as a security enhanced localized domain to promote the handover performance. To evaluate the performance improvement in local administrative domain, we implement the security protocols adopted by our proposal in the ns-2 simulation environment and analyze the measurement results based on our simulation test

A formally verified AKA protocol for vertical handover in heterogeneous environments using Casper/FDR

Next generation networks will comprise different wireless networks including cellular technologies, WLAN and indoor technologies. To support these heterogeneous environments, there is a need to consider a new design of the network infrastructure. Furthermore, this heterogeneous environment implies that future devices will need to roam between different networks using vertical handover techniques. When a mobile user moves into a new foreign network, data confidentiality and mutual authentication between the user and the network are vital issues in this heterogeneous environment. This article deals with these issues by first examining the implication of moving towards an open architecture, and then looking at how current approaches such as the 3GPP, HOKEY and mobile ethernet respond to the new environment while trying to address the security issue. The results indicate that a new authentication and key agreement protocol is required to secure handover in this environment. Casper/FDR, is used in the analysis and development of the protocol. The proposed protocol has been proven to be successful in this heterogeneous environment

Autenticazione degli utenti in scenari WLAN-3G: valutazione delle caratteristiche e prestazioni di protocolli ed architetture.

Studio ed analisi dei protocolli di autenticazione per l'interworking delle reti 3G e WLAN. Dopo aver analizzato l'architettura di rete e i protocolli già standardizzati, vengono evidenziate lacune e difetti e i tentativi in letteratura per ovviare a questi inconvenienti. Viene anche proposto un possibile protocollo che supporti la maggior parte delle caratteristiche necessarie per un buon funzionamento

Next generation mobile wireless hybrid network interworking architecture

It is a universally stated design requirement that next generation mobile systems will be compatible and interoperable with IPv6 and with various access technologies such as IEEE 802.11x. Discussion in the literature is currently as to whether the recently developed High Speed Packet Access (HSPA) or the developing Long Term Evaluation (LTE) technology is appropriate for the next generation mobile wireless system. However, the HSPA and the LTE technologies are not sufficient in their current form to provide ubiquitous data services. The third–generation mobile wireless network (3G) provides a highly developed global service to customers through either circuit switched or packet switched networks; new mobile multimedia services (e.g. streaming/mobile TV, location base services, downloads, multiuser games and other applications) that provide greater flexibility for the operator to introduce new services to its portfolio and from the user point of view, more services to select and a variety of higher, on-demand data rates compared with 2.5-2.75G mobile wireless system. However cellular networks suffer from a limited data rate and expensive deployment. In contrast, wireless local area networks (WLAN) are deployed widely in small areas or hotspots, because of their cost-effectiveness, ease of deployment and high data rates in an unlicensed frequency band. On the other hand, WLAN (IEEE 802.11x) cannot provide wide coverage cost-efficiently and is therefore at a disadvantage to 3G in the provision of wide coverage. In order to provide more services at high data rates in the hotspots and campus-wide areas, 3G service providers regard WLAN as a technology that compliments the 3G mobile wireless system. The recent evolution and successful deployment of WLANs worldwide has yielded demand to integrate WLANs with 3G mobile wireless technologies seamlessly. The key goal of this integration is to develop heterogeneous mobile data networks, capable of supporting ubiquitous data services with high data rates in hotspots. The effort to develop heterogeneous networks – also referred to fourth-generation (4G) mobile wireless data networks – is linked with many technical challenges including seamless vertical handovers across WLAN and 3G radio technologies, security, common authentication, unified accounting & billing, WLAN sharing (by several mobile wireless networks – different operators), consistent QoS and service provisioning, etc. This research included modelling a hybrid UMTS/WLAN network with two competent couplings: Tight Coupling and Loose Coupling. The coupling techniques were used in conjunction with EAP-AKA for authentication and Mobile IP for mobility management. The research provides an analysis of the coupling techniques and highlights the advantages and disadvantages of the coupling techniques. A large matrix of performance figures were generated for each of the coupling techniques using Opnet Modeller, a network simulation tool

A Survey on Authentication and Key Agreement Protocols in Heterogeneous Networks

Unlike current closed systems such as 2nd and 3rd generations where the core network is controlled by a sole network operator, multiple network operators will coexist and manage the core network in Next Generation Networks (NGNs). This open architecture and the collaboration between different network operators will support ubiquitous connectivity and thus enhances users' experience. However, this brings to the fore certain security issues which must be addressed, the most important of which is the initial Authentication and Key Agreement (AKA) to identify and authorize mobile nodes on these various networks. This paper looks at how existing research efforts the HOKEY WG, Mobile Ethernet and 3GPP frameworks respond to this new environment and provide security mechanisms. The analysis shows that most of the research had realized the openness of the core network and tried to deal with it using different methods. These methods will be extensively analysed in order to highlight their strengths and weaknesses

WI-FI ALLIANCE HOTSPOT 2.0 SPECIFICATION BASED NETWORK DISCOVERY, SELECTION, AUTHENTICATION, DEPLOYMENT AND FUNCTIONALITY TESTS.

The demand for high mobile data transmission has been dramatically enlarged since there is a significant increase at the number of mobile communication devices that capable of providing high data rates. It is clearly observed that even the next generation cellular networks are not able to respond to this demand to provide the required level of mobile data transmission capacity. Although, WLAN responses to this demand by providing upwards of 600 Mbps data rates it is not convenient in terms of cellular like mobility and requires user intervention anytime of reconnection to a hotspot. Therefore, the need for a new technology took place and IEEE has introduced a new amendment to IEEE 802.11 standards family which is called as IEEE 802.11u. Based on IEEE 802.11u amendment, WFA developed WFA Hotspot 2.0 Specification and started to certify the Wi-Fi devices under Passpoint certification program. This new technology developed to provide Wi-Fi capable devices simply identify, select and associate to a Hotspot without any user intervention in a highly secure manner. As Hotspot 2.0 Specification is quite new in the market it has been a challenging work to reach some academic papers; however, IEEE 802.11u standard, Internet sources, white papers published by different companies/organizations and discussions with telecommunication experts have made this master thesis to achieve its goals. This thesis work provides a great resource for the network operators to have a great understanding of the Hotspot 2.0 Specification in terms of theory, network element requirements and deployment by providing a good understanding of the system functionality. In this paper, a comprehensive theoretical background that addresses to WLAN technology, Passpoint elements, and IEEE 802.11u based network discovery, selection and authentication is provided. Besides, Hotspot 2.0 network deployment scenarios with network core element requirements are designed and Passpoint functionality tests are performed under different scenarios by describing a comprehensive setup for the testing.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

An integrated approach to QoS and security in future mobile networks using the Y-Comm framework

Future networks will comprise a wide variety of wireless networks. Users will expect to be always connected from anywhere and at any time as connections will be switched to available networks using vertical handover techniques. However, different networks have different Qualities-of-Service (QoS) so a QoS framework is needed to help applications and services deal with this new environment. In addition, since these networks must work together, future mobile systems will have an open, instead of the currently closed, architecture. Therefore new mechanisms will be needed to protect users, servers and network infrastructure. This means that future mobile networks will have to integrate communications, mobility, quality-of-service and security. However, in order to achieve this integration without affecting the flexibility of future networks, there is a need for novel methods that address QoS and security in a targeted manner within specific situations. Also, there is a need for a communication framework wherein these methods along with the communication and handover mechanisms could be integrated together. Therefore, this research uses the Y-Comm framework, which is a communication architecture to support vertical handover in Next Generations Networks, as an example of future communication frameworks that integrate QoS, security, communication and mobility mechanisms. Within the context of Y-Comm, research has been conducted to address QoS and security in heterogeneous networks. To preserve the flexibility of future network, the research in this thesis proposes the concept of Targeted Models to address security and QoS in specific scenarios: to address the QoS issue, a new QoS framework is introduced in this thesis, which will define targeted QoS models that will provide QoS in different situations such as connection initiation and in the case of handover. Similarly, to deal with the security side, targeted security models are proposed to address security in situations like connection initiation and handover. To define the targeted models and map them to actual network entities, research has been conducted to define a potential structure for future networks along with the main operational entities. The cooperation among these entities will define the targeted models. Furthermore, in order to specify the security protocols used by the targeted security models, an Authentication and Key Agreement framework is introduced to address security at different levels such as network and service levels. The underlying protocols of the Authentication and Key Agreement protocol are verified using Casper/FDR, which is a well-known, formal methods- based tool. The research also investigates potential methods to implement the proposed security protocols. To enable the implementation of some of the targeted security models, the research also proposes major enhancements to the current addressing, naming and location systems

IP Mobility in Wireless Operator Networks

Wireless network access is gaining increased heterogeneity in terms of the types of IP capable access technologies. The access network heterogeneity is an outcome of incremental and evolutionary approach of building new infrastructure. The recent success of multi-radio terminals drives both building a new infrastructure and implicit deployment of heterogeneous access networks. Typically there is no economical reason to replace the existing infrastructure when building a new one. The gradual migration phase usually takes several years. IP-based mobility across different access networks may involve both horizontal and vertical handovers. Depending on the networking environment, the mobile terminal may be attached to the network through multiple access technologies. Consequently, the terminal may send and receive packets through multiple networks simultaneously. This dissertation addresses the introduction of IP Mobility paradigm into the existing mobile operator network infrastructure that have not originally been designed for multi-access and IP Mobility. We propose a model for the future wireless networking and roaming architecture that does not require revolutionary technology changes and can be deployed without unnecessary complexity. The model proposes a clear separation of operator roles: (i) access operator, (ii) service operator, and (iii) inter-connection and roaming provider. The separation allows each type of an operator to have their own development path and business models without artificial bindings with each other. We also propose minimum requirements for the new model. We present the state of the art of IP Mobility. We also present results of standardization efforts in IP-based wireless architectures. Finally, we present experimentation results of IP-level mobility in various wireless operator deployments.Erilaiset langattomat verkkoyhteydet lisääntyvät Internet-kykyisten teknologioiden muodossa. Lukuisten eri teknologioiden päällekkäinen käyttö johtuu vähitellen ja tarpeen mukaan rakennetusta verkkoinfrastruktuurista. Useita radioteknologioita (kuten WLAN, GSM ja UMTS) sisältävien päätelaitteiden (kuten älypuhelimet ja kannettavat tietokoneet) viimeaikainen kaupallinen menestys edesauttaa uuden verkkoinfrastruktuurin rakentamista, sekä mahdollisesti johtaa verkkoteknologioiden kirjon lisääntymiseen. Olemassa olevaa verkkoinfrastruktuuria ei kaupallisista syistä kannata korvata uudella teknologialla yhdellä kertaa, vaan vaiheittainen siirtymävaihe kestää tyypillisesti useita vuosia. Internet-kykyiset päätelaitteet voivat liikkua joko saman verkkoteknologian sisällä tai eri verkkoteknologioiden välillä. Verkkoympäristöstä riippuen liikkuvat päätelaitteet voivat liittyä verkkoon useiden verkkoyhteyksien kautta. Näin ollen päätelaite voi lähettää ja vastaanottaa tietoliikennepaketteja yhtäaikaisesti lukuisia verkkoja pitkin. Tämä väitöskirja käsittelee Internet-teknologioiden liikkuvuutta ja näiden teknologioiden tuomista olemassa oleviin langattomien verkko-operaattorien verkkoinfrastruktuureihin. Käsiteltäviä verkkoinfrastruktuureita ei alun perin ole suunniteltu Internet-teknologian liikkuvuuden ja monien yhtäaikaisten yhteyksien ehdoilla. Tässä työssä ehdotetaan tulevaisuuden langattomien verkkojen arkkitehtuurimallia ja ratkaisuja verkkovierailujen toteuttamiseksi. Ehdotettu arkkitehtuuri voidaan toteuttaa ilman mittavia teknologisia mullistuksia. Mallin mukaisessa ehdotuksessa verkko-operaattorin roolit jaetaan selkeästi (i) verkko-operaattoriin, (ii) palveluoperaattoriin ja (iii) yhteys- sekä verkkovierailuoperaattoriin. Roolijako mahdollistaa sen, että kukin operaattorityyppi voi kehittyä itsenäisesti, ja että teennäiset verkkoteknologiasidonnaisuudet poistuvat palveluiden tuottamisessa. Työssä esitetään myös alustava vaatimuslista ehdotetulle mallille, esimerkiksi yhteysoperaattorien laatuvaatimukset. Väitöskirja esittelee myös liikkuvien Internet-teknologioiden viimeisimmän kehityksen. Työssä näytetään lisäksi standardointituloksia Internet-kykyisissä langattomissa arkkitehtuureissa