Wireless communication networks and swarm intelligence

This paper is a comprehensive survey on the role of swarm intelligence in wireless communication networks. The main aim of preparing this paper is to lead the way for the researchers in the field of wireless networks to recognize the role of swarm intelligence in optimizing the network features. The research paths are divided into four main tracks which are: network routing, network quality of service, network congestion, and network security. Swarm intelligence involves a wide range of applications but in this paper, we are focusing on its adaptability with the communication networks to accomplish performance optimization. In each of the four tracks, three standards-based networks are examined to show the effect of swarm intelligence on these networks which are IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.16, and IEEE 802.20. At the end of each section, a graphical qualitative comparison is represented to show the performance differences in terms of network optimization.

     

Multifold node authentication in mobile ad hoc networks

An ad hoc network is a collection of nodes that do not need to rely on a predefined infrastructure to keep the network connected. Nodes communicate amongst each other using wireless radios and operate by following a peer‐to‐peer network model. In this article, we propose a multifold node authentication approach for protecting mobile ad hoc networks. The security requirements for protecting data link and network layers are identified and the design criteria for creating secure ad hoc networks using multiple authentication protocols are analysed. Such protocols, which are based on zero‐knowledge and challenge‐response techniques, are presented through proofs and simulation results. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Full-duplex medium access control protocols in wireless networks: a survey

Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol plays an important role in full-duplex wireless networks. Theoretically, full-duplex communications have this ability to increase the capacity of traditional half-duplex wireless systems by up to twice. However, designing and implementing an efficient MAC protocol is a central issue in this way. Increasing throughput, collision avoidance, and fairness are common challenges in designing an efficient full-duplex MAC protocol. After giving a short introduction to the general classification of traditional MAC protocols, IEEE 802.11 MAC protocol, and the identified challenges of full-duplex communications in wireless networks, this review paper provides a comprehensive survey of current major MAC protocols for full-duplex wireless communications and classifies them in to three categories i.e. distributed wireless local area networks, centralized wireless local area networks, and other types of networks. This paper also explores and gives a comparative analysis of current full-duplex MAC protocols with stating their advantages and disadvantages as well as comparing them one with another.

     

On the Impact of Quality of Protection in Wireless Local Area Networks with IP Mobility

Wireless local area networks (LANs) are vulnerable to malicious attacks due to their shared medium in unlicensed frequency spectrum, thus requiring security features for a variety of applications even at the cost of quality of service (QoS). However, there is very little work on investigating to what extent system performance is affected by security configurations with respect to mobility scenarios, heterogeneous networks, and different applications. In order to exploit the full potential of existing security solutions, we present a detailed experimental study to demonstrate the impacts of security features on performance by integrating cross-layer security protocols in a wireless LAN testbed with IP mobility. We introduce a quality of protection (QoP) model to indicate the benefits of security protocols and then measure the performance cost of security protocols in terms of authentication time, cryptographic overhead and throughput. Our measurements demonstrate that the effects of security protocols on QoS parameters span a wide range; for example, authentication time is between 0.11 and 6.28 s, which can potentially affect packet loss dramatically. We also find that for the same security protocol throughput in non-roaming scenarios can be up to two times higher than that in roaming scenarios. However, some protocols are robust against mobility with little variation in system performance; thus, it is possible to provision steady service by choosing security protocols when users’ mobility pattern is unknown. Furthermore, we provide observations on cross-layer security protocols and suggestions to the design of future security protocols for real-time services in wireless LANs.

Link Quality Estimation in Ad Hoc and Mesh Networks: A Survey and Future Directions

Higher layer applications, such as routing protocols and robot navigation systems, commonly depend upon link quality (LQ) estimates for improving the efficiency and reliability of wireless communications. LQ estimation is especially critical for maintaining connectivity in mobile ad hoc networks, which tend to be less reliable than infrastructure networks due to their decentralized and dynamic nature. However, estimating LQ for applications higher than the physical layer is challenging due to the underlying dynamics of wireless propagation and the mismatched temporal perspectives between the layers. Due to its relevance and difficulty, a significant research effort has been devoted to developing empirical methods for accurately estimating LQ. The goal of this survey is to provide a comprehensive review of the existing approaches to LQ estimation in IEEE 802.11-based ad hoc and mesh networks, with some exceptions that include sensor networks. The survey organizes the literature according to the different fundamental techniques, and also compares them in terms in terms of strengths and weaknesses. Finally, we conclude with the latest developments in LQ estimation, which involve machine learning, and provide recommendations for future work in the field.

     

Multipath Routing Techniques in Wireless Sensor Networks: A Survey

Multipath routing is an efficient technique to route data in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) because it can provide reliability, security and load balance, which are especially critical in the resource constrained system such as WSNs. In this paper we provide a survey of the state-of-the-art of proposed multipath routing protocols for WSNs, which are classified into three categories, infrastructure based, non-infrastructure based and coding based, based on the special techniques used in building multiple paths and delivering sensing data. For each category, we study the design of protocols, analyze the tradeoff of each design, and overview several representing protocols. In addition, we give a summery of design goals, challenges, and evaluation metrics for multipath routing protocols in resource constrained systems in general.     

Congestion control in wireless sensor and 6LoWPAN networks: toward the Internet of Things

The Internet of Things (IoT) is the next big challenge for the research community where the IPv6 over low power wireless personal area network (6LoWPAN) protocol stack is a key part of the IoT. Recently, the IETF ROLL and 6LoWPAN working groups have developed new IP based protocols for 6LoWPAN networks to alleviate the challenges of connecting low memory, limited processing capability, and constrained power supply sensor nodes to the Internet. In 6LoWPAN networks, heavy network traffic causes congestion which significantly degrades network performance and impacts on quality of service aspects such as throughput, latency, energy consumption, reliability, and packet delivery. In this paper, we overview the protocol stack of 6LoWPAN networks and summarize a set of its protocols and standards. Also, we review and compare a number of popular congestion control mechanisms in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and classify them into traffic control, resource control, and hybrid algorithms based on the congestion control strategy used. We present a comparative review of all existing congestion control approaches in 6LoWPAN networks. This paper highlights and discusses the differences between congestion control mechanisms for WSNs and 6LoWPAN networks as well as explaining the suitability and validity of WSN congestion control schemes for 6LoWPAN networks. Finally, this paper gives some potential directions for designing a novel congestion control protocol, which supports the IoT application requirements, in future work.

     

On energy efficiency of geographic opportunistic routing in lossy multihop wireless networks

Geographic opportunistic routing (GOR) is an emerging technique that can improve energy efficiency in lossy multihop wireless networks. GOR makes local routing decision by using nodes?? location information, and exploits the broadcast nature and spatial diversity of the wireless medium to improve the packet forwarding reliability. In this paper, our goal is to fully understand the principles and tradeoffs in GOR, thus provide insightful analysis and guidance to the design of more efficient routing protocols in multihop wireless networks. We propose a local metric, one-hop energy efficiency (OEE), to balance the packet advancement, reliability and energy consumption in GOR. We identify and prove important properties about GOR on selecting and prioritizing the forwarding candidates in order to maximize the expected packet advancement. Leveraging the proved properties, we then propose two localized candidate selection algorithms with O(N ³) running time to determine the forwarding candidate set that maximizes OEE, where N is the number of available next-hop neighbors. Through extensive simulations, we show that GOR applying OEE achieves better energy efficiency than the existing geographic routing and blind opportunistic routing schemes under different node densities and packet sizes.     

Strong roaming authentication technique for wireless and mobile networks

When one considers the broad range of wirelessly connected mobile devices used today, it is clear that integrating such network‐enabled devices into secure roaming over wireless networks is of essential importance. Over the years, many authentication protocols have been suggested to address this issue. Among these protocols, the recently proposed privacy‐preserving universal authentication protocol, Priauth, exceeds the security and efficiency of other authentication techniques. This paper studies the existing roaming authentication protocols and shows that they are not strong enough to provide secure roaming services in three aspects. Further, using Priauth as an example, we propose efficient remedies that fix the weaknesses. The experimental results show that the proposed approaches are feasible in practice. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A survey of current architectures for connecting wireless mobile ad hoc networks to the Internet

Connecting wired and wireless networks, and particularly mobile wireless ad hoc networks (MANETs) and the global Internet, is attractive in real‐world scenarios due to its usefulness and praticality. Because of the various architectural mismatches between the Internet and MANETs with regard to their communication topology, routing protocols, and operation, it is necessary to introduce a hybrid interface capable of connecting to the Internet using Mobile IP protocol and to MANETs owing to an ad hoc routing protocol. Specifically, the approaches available in the literature have introduced updated versions of Mobile IP agents or access points at the edge of the Internet to help MANET nodes get multi‐hop wireless Internet access. The main differences in the existing approaches concern the type of ad hoc routing protocol as well as the switching algorithm used by MANET nodes to change their current Mobile IP agents based on specific switching criteria. This paper surveys a variety of approaches to providing multi‐hop wireless Internet access to MANET nodes. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Signalling analysis in integrated 4G networks

Scarce radio resources and the ambition to increase the number of mobile customers with a guarantee of service are pushing mobile communication systems from homogeneous non‐service convergent 2G and convergent‐service 2.5G and 3G wireless systems to heterogeneous integrated and convergent service 4G networks. This evolution has had several consequences from network design, control and service management points of view. In the emerging integrated 4G networks one of the issues is the signalling of information related to different control purposes such as QoS, mobility and security signalling. In fact, some questions such as which are the candidate signalling protocols, and which approach of integrated signalling to be adopted (unified versus non‐unified) need to be considered in the context of the emerging 4G integrated network. This is precisely the scope of this paper. We first identify the requirements related to mobility, security/AAA and QoS signalling, then we consider candidate signalling protocols and we propose possible approaches in the integration of signalling in the context of 4G networks. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Verification of Secure Network Protocols in Uncertain Environments

In this paper, we present a method for protocol checking and verification using discrete event control. By protocol checking and verification, we mean verifying that a protocol is logically correct, that it does not cause deadlocks, and that it has been defined to respond to uncontrollable events that may occur in a system implementing it. Our approach differs from those previously suggested in two key ways. We extend the elementary theory of discrete event control to allow us to model more complicated protocols, including protocols relying on arbitrary counting models. We then present a maximum probability method for analyzing a protocol’s ability to react to a priori unspecified events. Unlike current protocol modeling, we use a pushdown automata for modeling protocols. This allows us to model protocols with greater fidelity. Our methods are illustrated using a simple two-level hierarchical protocol that defines the behavior of ad hoc wireless network nodes as they attempt to establish a secure connection. As wireless networks become more prevalent throughout the world, the off-line verification of protocols before they are implemented will help ensure that wireless network protocols are robust to security intrusions before they are deployed into the field. This will save time and money in the long run.     

Code pruning in opportunistic routing through bidirectional coding traffic comparison

Opportunistic routing (OR) significantly improves transmission reliability and network throughput in wireless mesh networks by utilizing the broadcast nature of the wireless medium. Through the integration of network coding (NC), the complicated coordination to select the best forwarding node (FN) in OR can be bypassed. However, the introduction of NC exacerbates the redundant‐packet‐transmission problem. To mitigate this issue, existing coded OR protocols either adopt the loss‐rate‐based approach, employ orthogonal vectors as coded feedback, or pursue the stream‐based coded OR model. However, these three solutions suffer inaccuracy and obsolescence of the loss‐rate measurement, false‐positive/false‐negative problem, and unavailability of hop‐by‐hop stream‐based OR, respectively. To address the previous problems, we propose a simple but practical coded feedback scheme, cumulative coding coefficient acknowledgement (C³ACK), based on the relevance between forward (coded packets received from upstream nodes) and backward coding traffic (coded packets overheard from downstream nodes), and apply C³ACK to both batch‐based and stream‐based coded OR models in order to prune redundant forward and backward coding traffic. Both testbed evaluation and simulation study show that our code‐pruning schemes can outperform existing approaches in terms of expected throughput and transmission count. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Secure group communication in wireless mesh networks

Wireless mesh networks (WMNs) have emerged as a promising technology that offers low-cost community wireless services. The community-oriented nature of WMNs facilitates group applications, such as webcast, distance learning, online gaming, video conferencing, and multimedia broadcasting. Security is critical for the deployment of these services. Previous work focused primarily on MAC and routing protocol security, while application-level security has received relatively little attention. In this paper we focus on providing data confidentiality for group communication in WMNs. Compared to other network environments, WMNs present new challenges and opportunities in designing such protocols. We propose a new protocol framework, Secure Group Overlay Multicast (SeGrOM), that employs decentralized group membership, promotes localized communication, and leverages the wireless broadcast nature to achieve efficient and secure group communication. We analyze the performance and discuss the security properties of our protocols. We demonstrate through simulations that our protocols provide good performance and incur a significantly smaller overhead than a baseline centralized protocol optimized for WMNs.     

Ad hoc network routing and security: A review

Ad hoc network is a collection of wireless mobile nodes dynamically forming a local area network without the use of any existing network infrastructure or centralized administration. One problem in the design of such network is its wireless vulnerabilities and limited physical security. This paper considers the security attributes and goals of ad hoc network, reviews the latest developments of current routing and security mechanissm including encryption, protocols, user authentication, and physical security. It also explores the new approaches trying to solve current problems and points out the future research directions. These methods will be helpful in the military and other security‐sensitive fields. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Novel Routing Protocol for Underwater Wireless Sensor Network Using Pareto Uninformed and Heuristic Search Techniques

In underwater communication, establishing a communication link between the sensor in the sea bed and the surface sinks is a daunting task. Further, the data has to be transmitted with minimum delay and maximum reliability. Therefore, the present study proposes a biobjective routing protocol for underwater wireless sensor networks. The existing protocols are reviewed and it is found that the traditional depth based and vector-based routing protocols are not able to tackle these conflicting objectives and hence suffer transmission failures with high delay. A biobjective optimization of delay and reliability of routes is proposed to obtain pareto-optimal routes employing uninformed search technique and a modified greedy best first search heuristic. Through simulation experiments, it is found that the biobjective protocol performs better than depth based, delay based and reliability-based routing protocols. However, since the biobjective routing problem in underwater wireless sensor networks is known to be NP-hard and dynamic in nature, the computational effort of uninformed search in yielding the exact solutions increases as the network size increases. The modified greedy best first search heuristic is employed to yield sub-optimal routes with less computational effort without compromising on the quality of the solutions and hence suitable for larger networks.

     

A graph theoretic framework for preventing the wormhole attack in wireless ad hoc networks

Wireless ad hoc networks are envisioned to be randomly deployed in versatile and potentially hostile environments. Hence, providing secure and uninterrupted communication between the un-tethered network nodes becomes a critical problem. In this paper, we investigate the wormhole attack in wireless ad hoc networks, an attack that can disrupt vital network functions such as routing. In the wormhole attack, the adversary establishes a low-latency unidirectional or bi-directional link, such as a wired or long-range wireless link, between two points in the network that are not within communication range of each other. The attacker then records one or more messages at one end of the link, tunnels them via the link to the other end, and replays them into the network in a timely manner. The wormhole attack is easily implemented and particularly challenging to detect, since it does not require breach of the authenticity and confidentiality of communication, or the compromise of any host. We present a graph theoretic framework for modeling wormhole links and derive the necessary and sufficient conditions for detecting and defending against wormhole attacks. Based on our framework, we show that any candidate solution preventing wormholes should construct a communication graph that is a subgraph of the geometric graph defined by the radio range of the network nodes. Making use of our framework, we propose a cryptographic mechanism based on local broadcast keys in order to prevent wormholes. Our solution does not need time synchronization or time measurement, requires only a small fraction of the nodes to know their location, and is decentralized. Hence, it is suitable for networks with the most stringent constraints such as sensor networks. Finally, we believe our work is the first to provide an analytical evaluation in terms of probabilities of the extent to which a method prevents wormholes. Radha Poovendran received the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1999. He has been an Assistant Professor in the Electrical Engineering Department, University of Washington, Seattle, since September 2000. His research interests are in the areas of applied cryptography for multiuser environment, wireless networking, and applications of information theory to security. Dr. Poovendran is a recipient of the Faculty Early Career Award from the National Science Foundation (2001), Young Investigator Award from the Army Research Office (2002), Young Investigator Award from the Office of Naval Research (2004), and the 2005 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, for his research contributions in the areas of wired and wireless multiuser security. Loukas Lazos received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from the Electrical Engineering Department, National Technical University of Athens, Athens, Greece, in 2000 and 2002, respectively. He is currently working towards the Ph.D. degree in the Electrical Engineering Department, University of Washington, Seattle. His current research interests focus on cross-layer designs for energy-efficient key management protocols for wireless ad-hoc networks, as well as secure localization systems for sensor networks.     

A survey on routing protocols for wireless sensor networks

Recent advances in wireless sensor networks have led to many new protocols specifically designed for sensor networks where energy awareness is an essential consideration. Most of the attention, however, has been given to the routing protocols since they might differ depending on the application and network architecture. This paper surveys recent routing protocols for sensor networks and presents a classification for the various approaches pursued. The three main categories explored in this paper are data-centric, hierarchical and location-based. Each routing protocol is described and discussed under the appropriate category. Moreover, protocols using contemporary methodologies such as network flow and quality of service modeling are also discussed. The paper concludes with open research issues.     

Routing Algorithms for MANET-IoT Networks: A Comprehensive Survey

With the powerful evolution of wireless communication systems in recent years, mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) are more and more applied in many fields such as environment, energy efficiency, intelligent transport systems, smart agriculture, and IoT ecosystems, as well as expected to contribute role more and more important in the future Internet. However, due to the characteristic of the mobile ad hoc environment, the performance is dependent mainly on the deployed routing protocol and relative low. Therefore, routing protocols should be more flexible and intelligent to enhance network performance. This paper surveyed and analysed a series of recently proposed routing protocols for MANET-IoT networks. Results have shown that these protocols are classified into four main categories: performance improvement, quality of service (QoS-aware), energy-saving, and security-aware. Most protocols are evolved from these existing traditional protocols. Then, we compare the performance of the four traditional routing protocols under the different movement speeds of the network node aim determines the most stable routing protocol in smart cities environments. The experimental results showed that the proactive protocol work is good when the movement network nodes are low. However, the reactive protocols have more stable and high performance for high movement network scenarios. Thus, we confirm that the proposal of the routing protocols for MANET becomes more suitable based on improving the ad hoc on-demand distance vector routing protocol. This study is the premise for our further in-depth research on IoT ecosystems.

     

Securing reliable server pooling in MANET against byzantine adversaries

Reliable server pooling (rSerPool) is an architecture and a set of protocols allowing a service provider to run several servers that can reliably provide the same service. Should a particular server fail while providing its service, another server can efficiently replace it. This property is attractive not only for wired but also for wireless networks. However, the unique characteristics of mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) bring serious reliability and security challenges to the application of rSerPool. In this paper, we perform a comprehensive investigation of the security of rSerPool in MANET against both server failures and, especially, Byzantine attacks. We formulate security requirements for rSerPool in MANET and design efficient, distributed, and survivable security solutions for both main phases of rSerPool: service discovery and service provision. Specifically, we secure the service discovery phase by using a secure multiple-dominating set creation protocol, and the service provision phase by using a novel type of threshold signature scheme. Both protocols address novel security goals and are of independent interest as they can find applications to other areas; most notably, the construction of a distributed and survivable public-key infrastructure in MANET.