SeCurity for Ad-Hoc Networks

Projects on SCAN: SeCurity for Ad-Hoc Networks

URSA: A Ubiquitous and Robust Security Architecture for Wireless Mobile Networks

URSA targets at providing ubiquitous and robust security services for mobile users in a large-scale ad hoc wireless network. The key observation in URSA is to localize the service instantiation to achieve ubiquitous service availability and robustness while scale to the network size. We propose a localized trust model that lays the foundation, and propose a suit of full-distributed algorithms and protocols that handle occasional node break-ins, node mobility, roaming attacks and network dynamics. Our mechanisms are based on the secret-share techniques with revised algorithms to fit in the ad hoc wireless network environments. Simulations are employed to test the scalability and robustness of our communication protocols and we have a prototype to demonstrate the feasibility of our schemes.

People: Publications: Posters:

Adaptive Security for Multi-layer Ad-hoc Networks
Secure communication is critical in military environments where the network infrastructure is vulnerable to various attacks and compromises. A conventional centralized solution breaks down when the security servers are destroyed by the enemies. In this paper we design and evaluate a security framework for multi-layer ad-hoc wireless networks with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). In battlefields, the framework adapts to the contingent damages on network infrastructure.

Depending on the availability of network infrastructure, our design is composed of two modes. In infrastructure mode, security services, specifically the authentication services, are implemented on UAVs that feature low overhead and flexible managements. When the UAVs fail or are destroyed, our system seamlessly switches to infrastructureless mode, a backup mechanism that maintains comparable security services among the surviving units. In the infrastructureless mode, the security services are localized to each node's vicinity to comply with the ad-hoc communication mechanism in the scenario.

People: Publications: Posters:
  • Jiejun Kong, Kaixin Xu, Haiyun Luo, Daniel Lihui Gu, Mario Gerla and Songwu Lu, "Secure Mobile UAV-MBN Network," presented in the 2001 Annual UCLA Computer Science Department Research Review, Apr.27, 2001

 

Network Performance Centric Security Design in Ad Hoc Networks 
This project is motivated by the network performance centric perspective in the security design in mobile ad hoc networks. Although crypto-analysis is important to examine the security strength of one security system, the actual security strength of the system, when deployed in a large-scale ad hoc network, always lags behind the crypto-analysis results. We believe that the examination of the network performance of the security design is as important as the crypto-analysis of its security strength. 

We propose several network performance metrics, specifically, scalability, availability, robustness, communication overhead and computation complexity, and examine the network performance of several popular or promising security designs along these dimensions. We show that from the network performance perspective, it is desirable for the security solution to be distributed and localized through collaboration among local neighboring nodes.

People: Publication: Posters:
  • Hao Yang, Gary Zhong, Jiejun Kong, Haiyun Luo, Songwu Lu, "SCAN: Security for Ad Hoc Networks," presented in the 2002 Annual UCLA Computer Science Department Research Review, Apr.26, 2002
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Self-Organized Network-Layer Security in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks 
This project targets at protecting the network layer, namely the packet delivery functionality, in mobile ad hoc networks. We propose a network-layer security solution to protect the routing and packet forwarding activities through a unified framework that encompasses three indispensable security functionalities of prevention, detection and reaction. We take a self-organized approach by exploiting fully localized design in the security solution. The local neighboring nodes collaboratively monitor each other, sustain each other, and react to the malicious attackers. We further cross-validate the information from individual nodes to improve the accuracy and defeat the compromised nodes. We also propose a credit-based token renewal mechanism to gradually decrease the overhead for the legitimate node. The effectiveness of our design is demonstrated by ns-2 simulations.

People:

Publications:
  • Hao Yang, Xiaoqiao Meng, Songwu Lu, "Self-Organized Network-Layer Security in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks," ACM MOBICOM Wireless Security Workshop (WiSe'02), Atlanta, Sepetmber, 2002
  • Hao Yang, James Shu, Xiaoqiao Meng, Songwu Lu, "SCAN: Self-Organized Network-Layer Security in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks," in preparation, available upon request
Codes Release:
  • Ns-2 implementation of the protocol suite in SCAN, available upon request
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