Reference no: EM13347418

Network simulation on Hierarchical Network Rerouting against wormhole attacks

Hierarchical Network Rerouting against wormhole attacks

I. Introduction:

• Background and Motivation

Most of the time, data communication speaks of datagram transmission from one node (machine or sub-network) or origin to another node, that is, destination. The procedure can be straightforward if at some point, there exist a direct connection; from one node to another. In spite of this, considerable nodes sizes are usually employed to several industries that organization is definitely hard to achieve. This means that connection is not as swift as it may seem considering the direct link requirement of these nodes. On the hand, because of this case, the nodes are attached to other connectors called neighbours. This is will allow the datagram to be transmitted from one source to another node and so on. This means that many intermediate nodes are also included during the process before the transmission ends at its final point. However, it should be noted that the routing problem needs specific algorithm and programmers should select from which neighbour to transmit the datagram. This is the reason why combinations are imperative in order to allow successful transmission.

Ad hoc networks are established in various processes. In fact, the networks function in the license free frequency band; thus, do not need any outlay in infrastructure. Because of this, the technology becomes more appealing in the field of military and other commercial applications. Unfortunately, because of these features, the system becomes weak and susceptible to attacks. Moreover, the vulnerability intensifies because of the absence of infrastructure, inadequate physical protection, wireless connection between nodes and the insufficiency of a centralized monitoring or management system that will examine possible intrusion within the system. One of the many security attacks that are popular to network routing is the wormhole attack. A severe security attack, this has been identified within the ground of ad-hoc networks.

Nodes in ad hoc networks especially the existence of malicious nodes can infect the network with wormhole attacks. When this happens, a false scenario on neighbour relations, that is, among mobile nodes, is being created. The attacks, when not attended to, will endanger the safety of ad hoc routing protocols and other security technologies applied to the networks. Once the attack phase starts, the malicious node accesses the packets from a particular network location. When this happens, it directs the attack to another malicious node at a certain point. This repeats locally and can be created in different processes

II. RELATED WORK :

1. WSNs: Typical Components

Wireless technology has already reached greater heights in this modern era. Because of innovation and science, the ways technology has evolved is faster than anyone has expected. Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are considered the next big thing in union of technology and nature. The said applications are varied and will be more diverse in the near future. WSNs are groups of small devices termed as motes that have limited computational capacity. In fact, every mote has an estimated 1-100th of the computing power of a PDA. However, once joined with hundreds of other motes, the combination creates a very intricate and able system. WSNs are employed to improve data collection in the field of science. In fact, this is also used to establish military defence, inspect machineries in factories and even identify the source of a gunshot. These features are determined by the technology's data collection method. These collections involve certain factors such as vibration, moisture, temperature and light.

As mentioned, wireless sensor networks are made up of motes. Motes are considered the individual computers that usually operate together to establish networks. Because the procedure is complex, the requirements for such are also big. These include being energy efficient, small, and multifunctional and of course, wireless. The collections of motes are interconnected in order to achieve a particular objective. However, the goal is very specific that the process should be definitive for proper usage. A mote is small and minimal yet a powerful technology for wireless sensor network. Motes are made up if five important parts. These components involve moisture, temperature, power source and vibration sensors. For older motes, two AA batteries are also a major component together with a so-called "electric brain", and radio transmitter/ receiver.

2. Sensor Networks Attacks

Because WSNs are new technologies with security vulnerabilities, it can be deduced that these are one of the many wireless innovations that is a target by many attackers. This can even be an excellent system to experiment new attacks applications, etc. Aside from classical system security attack that usually gives headache to network architects, an attacker can also pry over communication transmission and usually execute traffic analysis in order to investigate the ins and outs of the network or system. What can even add to the severity is the insertion of false messages into the entire network. At some point, other attack types perform the violating availability case wherein there is denial of service from users or providers. This creates wireless channel jamming and can even drain the battery life of the entire parts of WSNs.

Although there are several strategies for areas of security, the potential for an attacker to enter and alter the internal state of a sensor node is usually a feature for most sensor networks. In fact, such attack technique is recognized as the node capture in the literature. It should be noted that node capture attacks have fundamental implications in the said technology especially what the WSNs architecture has.

Wormhole attacks in wireless ad hoc networks can affect the entire network most especially destroying the functionality of the network and even compromising the security of the entire technology. This can be done by decaying the routing protocols and damaging the security support of the entire system. Although at some point the wormhole can be a useful in many networking service since this is needed to stage long network connection to the connection layer and up, the attacker will be given the advantage to use the said link or connection. Once the attacker draws in data traffic utilizing the wormhole, the said situation will affect the data flow by indicating and changing the data packets. This will create unwarranted or unguarded routing actions by changing the connection of the wormhole from time to time. What makes everything worst is that, the attacker will be able to record the traffic and take confidential information from the users. Because of the wormholes present, the attacker will also have the chance to disrupt protocols that is directly or indirectly associated with the geographic proximity of the protocol. A concrete example of the said situation is when target tracking applications in sensor networks can be clouded by the existence of wormholes. Because of this, wormholes influence the association of the networks established by localization algorithms such that two neighbouring nodes are contained at proximate areas and the wormhole connections "fold" the whole system of network.

3. Securing Routing Protocols

Securing routing protocols are imperative in understanding networks, protocols and connections. One of the major attack points that should be given priority is the attack against the routers and the mechanisms that are in charge for operating the protocols. This happens because such travels the best path of network destination and also advances the packets along easier paths. Because of this, the analysis signals in the concept that is best to attack a target at rest than attacking it in motion. This is where information gathering is no exemption to the case. In fact, it is easier to acquire routing information, data association and affect data transmission utilizing a network from a router than utilizing the wires between routers. One of the trusted procedures in securing routing information on the wire is to substantiate and confirm routing protocol packets through Message Digest Algorithm 5 (MD5) or IP Security (IPsec) signatures. In this case, a cryptographic signature needs to address three important aspects, the encryption algorithm; the key used for the encryption process and of course, the contents of the packets. It has to be deduced that the key used in encryption algorithm should be shared secretly by the routers that process the authentication. In most cases, the creator of the routing database will be responsible in generating the signature with the use of the key. Once this happens, the routing data will function by sending the inputs to the encryption algorithm. The router provided to receive the data will repeat the entire procedure by allowing the use of the designated key once the transmission was done and similar routing data applied.

In order to achieve successful security procedure, one must fulfil all requirements needed in order to safeguard the path discovery; ensuring the destinations function correctly despite the manifestation of malicious adversaries. These requirements are the following: route signalling cannot be deceived, routing messages cannot also be changed while transmission happens, fabricated routing messages cannot be inserted within the network, routes cannot be redirected utilizing the shortest possible path by malicious action, and lastly, malicious actions should not be able to generate routing loops.

However, these requirements are intended for open environment. There are also additional requirement for enhance the security protocol. In this case, unauthorized nodes should not be disregarded from the route computation and discovery. The said condition should not be removed from the concept that authenticated users might also become rogue and malicious users as well. Since it is an open environment, it should be noted that advantage of so-called pre-deployment or exchange keys, session keys and other pertinent certificates. Moreover, the network topology should not also be subjected to adversaries or authorized nodes via routing messages.

4. Securing Wireless Sensor Networks

Since WSNs are vulnerable to attacks, security should be a major priority especially during system operations. This will not only effectively process transmission; it will also help in the stabilization of the security infrastructure and allow the proper monitoring of malicious activities that sometimes are overlooked by the maintenance team. The said system is usually where routing starts. This is also where communication paths, that is, between sensor nodes and forwards data is being set up. In cases where WSNs are integrated, especially when there are limited resources, it is imperative to create single path routing between the source and the destination nodes. It is imperative to understand that once the nodes fail along the path, the path itself fails and even the data, loss. Moreover, once routing is not given attention, the whole WSN system is also affected. In systems where sensitive applications are in, it is imperative to integrate reliable and available processes that will not only serve its purpose but will also protect the data in the system. In most cases, the solution would be to create multiple paths in order to improve the availability of the technology and not compromising the reliability of the network. On the other hand, multiple paths mean extra security issues because there are more entrances for data transmission. This means more ways to invite adversaries from affecting the data. These complexities mean safeguarding the network in all possible ways and enhancing the processes by which data transmission is executed.

Another security requirement that needs to be addressed in WSNs applications is the being self-healing. In fact, availability is directly associated with network resiliency and self-healing requirements. In order for the system to endure attacks, the network has to guarantee its resiliency and provide uninterrupted services. This also means that once the network has healing capabilities, the more it the system gets resilient and available.

III. Propose work :

WSNs are multipath networks, which depend on the intermediate nodes to relay the data packet to the destination. These nodes are equipped with lesser memory, limited battery power, little computation capability, small range of communication and need a secured and efficient routing path to forward the incoming packet. In this paper, we propose a secure cluster based multipath routing protocol (SCMRP). Researchers have proposed clustered sensor networks to increase the efficiency (i.e. increase system throughput, save energy and decrease system delay by data aggregation) and multipath sensor networks to increase the resilience and reliability of the network. The SCMRP is the combination of these two sensor networks; therefore, it provides efficiency as well as reliability and the proper use of cryptographic algorithm provides sufficient security to the sensor network. Our SCMRP provides hierarchical Network Rerouting against wormhole we have provided a brief analysis to various issues related to key management, orphan nodes, security and energy efficiency.

IV. Conclusion and the Future of WSNs:

As technology is steadily changing and developing, WSNs will definitely drift with the tide and advance or innovate. Many believe that while security is likely a major issue in the improvement of the WSN industry, the system is already up for greater development especially with the idea of converging with Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). IPv6 is the latest version revision of the Internet Protocol. WSNs are advancing to a strategy where corporations become aware of the advantages and benefits to consumer interest. In fact, companies such as Microsoft, Google, Intel or IBM are trying to evaluate and analyse the essence of this and how it should be properly implemented in their businesses. In fact, new wireless protocols are also introduced in the field of wireless technology that WSNs are creating more possibilities and endless knowledge to technology junkies. However, the most promising solution is the merging of WSNs at network layer to IPv6. This is great news because the IP networking does not only go with the World Wide Web; it also reaches the homes of many people across the world. Because of this technology, consumers will be able to familiarize themselves with the new technology since it only deals with protocols that are already part of their way of life.

With WSNs converging with the IPv6, the case will definitely end the modern day protocol conflicts where different groups tend to criticize each other with the way they handle technology. Since infrastructure is the primary groundwork for such technology, comparisons will not be so much of an issue. However, it should be understood that the use of IPv6 in WSNs has still many issues to solve. Moreover, analysis and more research should still be conducted in order to fully maximize its potentials. Application layers and routing systems still need further debate in order to ensure that security is at its priority. In fact, the idea of a top layer protocols for communication and interconnectivity should also be addressed.

Regardless of what innovations be made with WSNs, there is no doubt that the said technology will eventually change and improve whatever the present enjoys. In fact, the future will mean better research techniques and random-key pre-distribution strategies that will support resiliency on node infrastructure. Because of these processes, the securing will be the utmost priority of all companies. High security on simple and uncomplicated large-scale networks will be a major significance. In fact, even on traditional networks, security is still the main concern. This means that with the growing need for fast paced technology, safeguarding information should not take the backseat. Cryptography maybe a standard defence; however, innovations must also be made to meet the demands of the changing time. Secrecy and authentication is definitely a must.