Mobile Ad Hoc networks, due to the unattended nature of the network itself and the dispersed location of nodes, are subject to several unique security issues. One of the most vexed security threat is node capture. A few solutions have already been proposed to address this problem; however, those solutions are either centralized or focused on theoretical mobility models alone. In the former case the solution does not fit well the distributed nature of the network while, in the latter case, the quality of the solutions obtained for realistic mobility models severely differs from the results obtained for theoretical models. The rationale of this paper is inspired by the observation that re-encounters of mobile nodes do elicit a form of social ties. Leveraging these ties, it is possible to design efficient and distributed algorithms that, with a moderated degree of node cooperation, enforce the emergent property of node capture detection. In particular, in this paper we provide a proof of concept proposing a set of algorithms that leverage, to different extent, node mobility and node cooperation--that is, identifying social ties--to thwart node capture attack. In particular, we test these algorithms on a realistic mobility scenario. Extensive simulations show the quality of the proposed solutions and, more important, the viability of the proposed approach.
Mobility as a means to enforce security in mobile networks has been considered in @cite_16 . In @cite_33 , the authors identified social and situational factors which impact group formation for wireless group key establishment. Further, mobility has been considered in the context of routing @cite_35 and of network property optimization @cite_22 . In particular, @cite_35 leverages node mobility in order to disseminate information about destination location without incurring any communication overhead. In @cite_22 the sink mobility is used to optimize the energy consumption of the whole network. A mobility-based solution for detecting the sybil attack has been recently presented in @cite_32 . Finally, note that a few solutions exist for node failure detection in ad hoc networks @cite_7 @cite_37 @cite_19 @cite_2 . However, such solutions assume a static network, missing a fundamental component of our scenario, as shown in the following.
@cite_35 @cite_37 @cite_22 @cite_33 @cite_7 @cite_32 @cite_19 @cite_2 @cite_16
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Mobility is often a problem for providing security services in ad hoc networks. In this paper, we show that mobility can be used to enhance security. Specifically, we show that nodes that passively monitor traffic in the network can detect a Sybil attacker that uses a number of network identities simultaneously. We show through simulation that this detection can be done by a single node, or that multiple trusted nodes can join to improve the accuracy of detection. We then show that although the detection mechanism will falsely identify groups of nodes traveling together as a Sybil attacker, we can extend the protocol to monitor collisions at the MAC level to differentiate between a single attacker spoofing many addresses and a group of nodes traveling in close proximity. This paper presents an analysis of the behavior of mobile ad hoc networks when group mobility is involved. We propose four different group mobility models and present a mobility pattern generator, called grcmob that we designed to be used with the ns-2 simulator. Using 2k factorial analysis we determine the most representative factors for protocol performance. We then evaluate the performance of a dynamic source routing (DSR) based MANET, using both TCP and UDP data traffic. The results are compared with the classical random waypoint mobility model. It is shown that the number of groups parameter is more important than the number of nodes one and that the impact of the area size is almost negligible. We make also evident that the mix of inter- and intra-group communication has the strongest impact on the performance. Finally, it is evidenced that the presence of groups forces the network topology to be sparser and therefore the probability of network partitions and node disconnections grows. Mobile Ad Hoc networks, due to the unattended nature of the network itself and the dispersed location of nodes, are subject to several unique security issues. One of the most vexed security threat is node capture. A few solutions have already been proposed to address this problem; however, those solutions are either centralized or focused on theoretical mobility models alone. In the former case the solution does not fit well the distributed nature of the network while, in the latter case, the quality of the solutions obtained for realistic mobility models severely differs from the results obtained for theoretical models. The rationale of this paper is inspired by the observation that re-encounters of mobile nodes do elicit a form of social ties. Leveraging these ties, it is possible to design efficient and distributed algorithms that, with a moderated degree of node cooperation, enforce the emergent property of node capture detection. In particular, in this paper we provide a proof of concept proposing a set of algorithms that leverage, to different extent, node mobility and node cooperation - that is, identifying social ties - to thwart node capture attack. In particular, we test these algorithms on a realistic mobility scenario. Extensive simulations show the quality of the proposed solutions and, more important, the viability of the proposed approach. Contrary to the common belief that mobility makes security more difficult to achieve, we show that node mobility can, in fact, be useful to provide security in ad hoc networks. We propose a technique in which security associations between nodes are established, when they are in the vicinity of each other, by exchanging appropriate cryptographic material. We show that this technique is generic, by explaining its application to fully self-organized ad hoc networks and to ad hoc networks placed under an (off-line) authority. We also propose an extension of this basic mechanism, in which a security association can be established with the help of a "friend". We show that our mechanism can work in any network configuration and that the time necessary to set up the security associations is strongly influenced by several factors, including the size of the deployment area, the mobility patterns, and the number of friends; we provide a detailed investigation of this influence.