Performance analysis of contending customer equipment in wireless networks

NoInitial ranging is the primary and important process in wireless networks for the customer premise equipments (CPEs) to access the network and establish their connections with the base station. Contention may occur during the initial ranging process. To avoid contention, the mandatory solution defined in the standards is based on a truncated binary exponential random backoff (TBERB) algorithm with a fixed initial contention window size. However, the TBERB algorithm does not take into account the possibility that the number of contended CPEs may change dynamically over time, leading to a dynamically changing collision probability. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to address this issue. There are three major contributions presented in this paper. First, a comprehensive analysis of initial ranging mechanisms in wireless networks is provided and initial ranging request success probability is derived based on number of contending CPEs and the initial contention window size. Second, the average ranging success delay is derived for the maximum backoff stages. It is found that the collision probability is highly dependent on the size of the initial contention window and the number of contending CPEs. To achieve the higher success probability or to reduce the collision probability among CPEs, the BS needs to adjust the initial contention window size. To keep the collision probability at a specific value for the particular number of contending CPEs, it is necessary for the BS to schedule the required size of the initial contention window to facilitate the maximum number of CPEs to establish their connections with reasonable delay. In our third contribution, the initial window size is optimized to provide the least upper bound that meets the collision probability constraint for a particular number of contending CPEs. The numerical results validate our analysis

Decoupling trust and wireless channel induced effects on collaborative sensing attacks

One of the most crucial functionalities of cognitive radio networks is spectrum sensing. Completing this task in an accurate manner requires opportunistic spectrum access. Traditionally, sensing has been performed through energy detection by each individual secondary user. In order to increase accuracy, individual measurements are aggregated using different fusion functions. However, even though collaborative spectrum sensing can increase accuracy under benign settings, it is prone to falsification attacks, where malicious secondary users report fake sensings. Previous studies have designed trust (reputation) based systems to contain the effect of the adversaries, ignoring to a large extent the wireless channel irregularities when performing the computation. In this paper, we decouple the reasons behind an incorrect sensing report and propose the Decoupling Trust and Capability Spectrum Sensing System (DTCS3). DTCS3 is a collaborative spectrum sensing system that takes into account both a secondary sensor node's trust and its capability to sense the channel. Through thorough evaluations that consider a large variety of attack strategies, we show that by accounting for wireless induced effects while calculating the reporting trust of a secondary user, we can significantly improve the performance of a collaborative spectrum sensing system as compared to existing schemes in the literature. In particular, the true positive/negative rates can be improved by as much as 38%, while DTCS 3 is able to track and respond to dynamic changes in the adversaries' behavior. © 2014 IEEE

Cooperative Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio Networks Using Multidimensional Correlations

In this paper, a multidimensional-correlation-based sensing scheduling algorithm, (CORN)2, is developed for cognitive radio networks to minimize energy consumption. A sensing quality metric is defined as a measure of the correctness of spectral availability information based on the fact that spectrum sensing information at a given space and time can represent spectrum information at a different point in space and time. The scheduling algorithm is shown to achieve a cost of sensing (e.g., energy consumption, sensing duration) arbitrarily close to the possible minimum, while meeting the sensing quality requirements. To this end, (CORN)2 utilizes a novel sensing deficiency virtual queue concept and exploits the correlation between spectrum measurements of a particular secondary user and its collaborating neighbors. The proposed algorithm is proved to achieve a distributed and arbitrarily close to optimal solution under certain, easily satisfied assumptions. Furthermore, a distributed Selective-(CORN)2 (S-(CORN)2) is introduced by extending the distributed algorithm to allow secondary users to select collaboration neighbors in densely populated cognitive radio networks. In addition to the theoretically proved performance guarantees, the algorithms are evaluated through simulations

Byzantine Attack and Defense in Cognitive Radio Networks: A Survey

The Byzantine attack in cooperative spectrum sensing (CSS), also known as the spectrum sensing data falsification (SSDF) attack in the literature, is one of the key adversaries to the success of cognitive radio networks (CRNs). In the past couple of years, the research on the Byzantine attack and defense strategies has gained worldwide increasing attention. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey and tutorial on the recent advances in the Byzantine attack and defense for CSS in CRNs. Specifically, we first briefly present the preliminaries of CSS for general readers, including signal detection techniques, hypothesis testing, and data fusion. Second, we analyze the spear and shield relation between Byzantine attack and defense from three aspects: the vulnerability of CSS to attack, the obstacles in CSS to defense, and the games between attack and defense. Then, we propose a taxonomy of the existing Byzantine attack behaviors and elaborate on the corresponding attack parameters, which determine where, who, how, and when to launch attacks. Next, from the perspectives of homogeneous or heterogeneous scenarios, we classify the existing defense algorithms, and provide an in-depth tutorial on the state-of-the-art Byzantine defense schemes, commonly known as robust or secure CSS in the literature. Furthermore, we highlight the unsolved research challenges and depict the future research directions.Comment: Accepted by IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutoiral

Spectrum sensing, spectrum monitoring, and security in cognitive radios

Spectrum sensing is a key function of cognitive radios and is used to determine whether a primary user is present in the channel or not. In this dissertation, we formulate and solve the generalized likelihood ratio test (GLRT) for spectrum sensing when both primary user transmitter and the secondary user receiver are equipped with multiple antennas. We do not assume any prior information about the channel statistics or the primary user’s signal structure. Two cases are considered when the secondary user is aware of the energy of the noise and when it is not. The final test statistics derived from GLRT are based on the eigenvalues of the sample covariance matrix. In-band spectrum sensing in overlay cognitive radio networks requires that the secondary users (SU) periodically suspend their communication in order to determine whether the primary user (PU) has started to utilize the channel. In contrast, in spectrum monitoring the SU can detect the emergence of the PU from its own receiver statistics such as receiver error count (REC). We investigate the problem of spectrum monitoring in the presence of fading where the SU employs diversity combining to mitigate the channel fading effects. We show that a decision statistic based on the REC alone does not provide a good performance. Next we introduce new decision statistics based on the REC and the combiner coefficients. It is shown that the new decision statistic achieves significant improvement in the case of maximal ratio combining (MRC). Next we consider the problem of cooperative spectrum sensing in cognitive radio networks (CRN) in the presence of misbehaving radios. We propose a novel approach based on the iterative expectation maximization (EM) algorithm to detect the presence of the primary users, to classify the cognitive radios, and to compute their detection and false alarm probabilities. We also consider the problem of centralized binary hypothesis testing in a cognitive radio network (CRN) consisting of multiple classes of cognitive radios, where the cognitive radios are classified according to the probability density function (PDF) of their received data (at the FC) under each hypotheses

Spectrum Map and its Application in Cognitive Radio Networks

Recent measurements on radio spectrum usage have revealed the abundance of underutilized bands of spectrum that belong to licensed users. This necessitated the paradigm shift from static to dynamic spectrum access. Cognitive radio based secondary networks that utilize such unused spectrum holes in the licensed band, have been proposed as a possible solution to the spectrum crisis. The idea is to detect times when a particular licensed band is unused and use it for transmission without causing interference to the licensed user. We argue that prior knowledge about occupancy of such bands and the corresponding achievable performance metrics can potentially help secondary networks to devise effective strategies to improve utilization. In this work, we use Shepard\u27s method of interpolation to create a spectrum map that provides a spatial distribution of spectrum usage over a region of interest. It is achieved by intelligently fusing the spectrum usage reports shared by the secondary nodes at various locations. The obtained spectrum map is a continuous and differentiable 2-dimension distribution function in space. With the spectrum usage distribution known, we show how different radio spectrum and network performance metrics like channel capacity, secondary network throughput, spectral efficiency, and bit error rate can be estimated. We show the applicability of the spectrum map in solving the intra-cell channel allocation problem in centralized cognitive radio networks, such as IEEE 802.22. We propose a channel allocation scheme where the base station allocates interference free channels to the consumer premise equipments (CPE) using the spectrum map that it creates by fusing the spectrum usage information shared by some CPEs. The most suitable CPEs for information sharing are chosen on a dynamic basis using an iterative clustering algorithm. Next, we present a contention based media access control (MAC) protocol for distributed cognitive radio network. The unlicensed secondary users contend among themselves over a common control channel. Winners of the contention get to access the available channels ensuring high utilization and minimum collision with primary incumbent. Last, we propose a multi-channel, multi-hop routing protocol with secondary transmission power control. The spectrum map, created and maintained by a set of sensors, acts as the basis of finding the best route for every source destination pair. The proposed routing protocol ensures primary receiver protection and maximizes achievable link capacity. Through simulation experiments we show the correctness of the prediction model and how it can be used by secondary networks for strategic positioning of secondary transmitter-receiver pairs and selecting the best candidate channels. The simulation model mimics realistic distribution of TV stations for urban and non-urban areas. Results validate the nature and accuracy of estimation, prediction of performance metrics, and efficiency of the allocation process in an IEEE 802.22 network. Results for the proposed MAC protocol show high channel utilization with primary quality of service degradation within a tolerable limit. Performance evaluation of the proposed routing scheme reveals that it ensures primary receiver protection through secondary power control and maximizes route capacity

A Hierarchical Structure towards Securing Data Transmission in Cognitive Radio Networks

Cognitive Radio (CR) technology is considered as a promising technology to overcome spectrum scarcity problem in wireless networks, by sharing the spectrum between both unlicensed users (secondary users, (SUs)) and licensed users (primary users, (PUs)), provided that the SUs respect the PUs’ rights to use the spectrum exclusively. An important technical area in cognitive radio networks (CRNs) is wireless security. A secure CRN must meet different security requirements, which are: confidentiality, integrity, availability and authentication. Data confidentiality is a mandatory requirement in cognitive radio networks, generally to maintain the privacy of the data owner (PU or SU). Integrity means that data is transmitted from the source to the destination without alteration. While availability is to release the channels assigned to one SU as soon as a PU wants to use its spectrum. Authentication in CRN means that each node has to authenticate itself before it can use the available spectrum channels. New classes of security threats and challenges in CRNs have been introduced that target the different layers of OSI model and affect the security requirements. Providing strong security may prove to be the most difficult aspect of making CR a long-term commercially-viable concept. Protection of routes used for data transmission is a critical prerequisite to ensure the robustness of iv the routing process. Therefore, route discovery must be done in such a way that lets each node find the best secure path(s) for its data transmission. In this work, network security of CRN is improved through proposing different models that are built to fulfil the security requirements mentioned above. Improving the network security enhances the network performance, taking into consideration the quality of service (QoS) desired by the different network nodes such as bandwidth and time delay. This work aims to combine the spectrum sensing phase and the spectrum management phase, as well as to detect all the adversary nodes that slow down the network performance by selectively holding and not forwarding packets to their next hop(s). We measure the network node’s reliability for using network resources through a value called belief level (BL), which is considered as the main parameter for our entire work. BL is used to monitor the nodes’ behavior during the spectrum sensing phase, and then it is used to form the best path(s) during the spectrum management phase. Particularly, this work follows a hierarchical structure that has three different layers. At the bottom layer, a novel authentication mechanism is developed to fulfil the authentication and the availability security requirements, which ends assigning a belief level (BL) to each node. At the middle layer, the nodes’ behavior during the spectrum sensing phase is monitored to detect all the adversary node(s). Finally, at the top layer, a novel routing algorithm is proposed that uses the nodes’ security (BL) as a routing metric. SUs collaborate with each other to monitor other nodes’ behavior. Users’ data confidentiality and integrity are satisfied through this hierarchical structure that uses the cluster-based, central authority, and nodes collaboration concepts. By doing so, the traffic carried in the CRN is secured and adversary nodes are detected and penalized

Terminal cooperation in next generation wireless networks: aerial and regional access networks

Throughout the years, progress of humankind has depended on the power of communication and over the decades, the ways of communication has witnessed mammoth changes. Specifically wireless communication in the last decade has completely revolutionized the way we communicate with each other. Smartphones have become an ubiquitous part of our life. With most operators throughout the world deploying fourth generation wireless communication systems, peculiar use cases and scenarios are being envisioned such as public safety networks, aerial networks, etc. to be addressed by the next generation wireless systems. Moreover, as urban areas are becoming saturated commercial network operators are looking for business cases to move towards the untapped regional areas. However, to deploy networks in regional areas economically, novel technologies and architectures need to be developed and investigated. In this thesis, we study the novel concept of terminal cooperation in the context of next generation wireless communication systems especially looking into aerial and regional access networks. In the first part of the thesis, we investigate the physical radio channel for device-to-device (D2D) communication which would help in enabling terminal cooperation in wireless networks. Specifically, we propose propagation model for D2D in rural areas using 922 MHz and 2466 MHz, a channel model for vehicular communications using 5.8 GHz and a propagation model for D2D using millimetre wave frequencies. In the second part of the thesis, we evaluate the coverage performance of aerial access networks using different technologies and develop algorithms to enhance the coverage using terminal cooperation in regional access networks. Specifically, we evaluate the performance of two different technologies, LTE and WiFi, in aerial access networks. We propose game-theoretic algorithms to enable terminal cooperation to enhance coverage in regional access networks and perform system level simulation to evaluate the proposed algorithms. In the last part of this thesis, we analyse and develop techniques to enhance energy efficiency in aerial access networks using terminal cooperation. Specifically, we propose a clustering algorithm called EECAN which improves the energy efficiency of the terrestrial nodes accessing the aerial base-station, a clustering algorithm based on Matern Hardcore Point Process which allows us to optimize cluster head spacing analytically and we further enhance this algorithm by including impairments introduced by the wireless channel. Throughout this thesis, we verify and validate our analytic results, algorithms and techniques with Monte-Carlo simulations of the considered scenarios. Most of the work presented in this thesis was published in-part or as a whole in conferences, journals, book-chapters, project reports or otherwise undergoing a review process. These publications and reports are highlighted in the course of the thesis. Lastly, we invite the reader to enjoy exploring this thesis and we hope that it will add more understanding to this promising new technology of terminal cooperation in aerial and regional access networks