S. Kami Makki

A comparison of data serialization formats for optimal efficiency on a mobile platform

Because of the increase in easily obtainable internet-connected mobile devices and their unique characteristics, choosing the proper data serialization format has become increasingly difficult. These devices are resource scarce and bandwidth limited. In this paper, we compare four different data serialization formats with an emphasis on serialization speed, data size, and usability. The selected serialization formats include XML, JSON, Thrift, and ProtoBuf. XML and JSON are the most well known text-based data formats, while ProtoBuf and Thrift are relatively new binary serialization formats. These data serialization formats are tested on an Android device using both text-heavy and number-heavy objects.

Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) detection by traffic pattern analysis

In this paper, we propose a behavior-based detection that can discriminate Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack traffic from legitimated traffic regardless to various types of the attack packets and methods. Current DDoS attacks are carried out by attack tools, worms and botnets using different packet-transmission rates and packet forms to beat defense systems. These various attack strategies lead to defense systems requiring various detection methods in order to identify the attacks. Moreover, DDoS attacks can craft the traffics like flash crowd events and fly under the radar through the victim. We notice that DDoS attacks have features of repeatable patterns which are different from legitimate flash crowd traffics. In this paper, we propose a comparable detection methods based on the Pearson’s correlation coefficient. Our methods can extract the repeatable features from the packet arrivals in the DDoS traffics but not in flash crowd traffics. The extensive simulations were tested for the optimization of the detection methods. We then performed experiments with several datasets and our results affirm that the proposed methods can differentiate DDoS attacks from legitimate traffics.

Mobile and Wireless Network Security and Privacy

Mobile and Wireless Network Security and Privacy analyzes important security and privacy problems in the realms of wireless networks and mobile computing. The material includes a report to the National Science Foundation of the United States which will be used by program managers for the foundation in setting priorities for research directions in this area. In the following chapters field experts expand upon the report and provide further information about important research directions in the fields of wireless networks and mobile computing. The chapters are written by the leading international researchers and professionals in thes fields. Each chapter represents state-of-the-art research and includes several influential contributions. A multitude of valuable discussions on relevant concepts, such as the various approaches that define emerging security and privacy in mobile and wireless environment, are featured. The book is useful to researchers working in the fields of mobile and wireless security and privacy and to graduate students seeking new areas to perform research. It also provides information for academics and industry people researching recent trends and developments in the mobile and wireless security fields.

Mitigating routing misbehavior in multi-hop networks using evolutionary game theory

Multi-hop wireless networks have been an active research area for decades, however, the solutions proposed to solve routing misbehaviors are still not robust. In this paper, we use the evolutionary game theory (EGT) framework to address one issue of routing misbehavior, the problem of selfishness. We propose the use of distributed algorithms that are able to force selfish nodes to cooperate and forward packets from other nodes, despite their desire to “conserve energy” by not forwarding external packets.

Game theoretic analysis of cooperation in autonomous multi hop networks: The consequences of unequal traffic load

Researchers have investigated non cooperative issues in wireless sensor networks and mobile ad hoc networks in the past decade. In particular, packet forwarding is of critical importance in such multi hop networks. This is because there are no preexisting infrastructures. Each node must not only send and receive its own packets but also relay packets to other nodes. However, most work overlooks the fact that the traffic load at the center of the network is significantly higher than at the border when using existing routing protocols. Therefore, a node at the center is requested to forward more packets than a node at the border of the network. This inequality in traffic load can break down many solutions proposed to motivate nodes cooperation. In this paper, we quantify the number of packets a node is requested to forward as a function of its position. We show that, if a load balancing algorithm is not used in a distributed static network, cooperation ultimately breaks down as the number of nodes increases. We support our result by mathematical proofs.

Unpredictable Software-based Attestation Solution for node compromise detection in mobile WSN

Recent advancements in micro-computing have provided an exponential increase in the capabilities of a wide range of devices and have allowed the implementation of complex mobile wireless sensor networks (mWSNs). Common battery-powered sensor nodes require security techniques that eliminate redundant processing overhead for resource conservation, without compromising the overall network performance. To address this issue, this paper presents USAS: Unpredictable Software-based Attestation Solution, a node compromise detection algorithm in mWSNs. USAS deploys dynamic node attestation chains to decrease checksum computation time by almost 48% for selective attested nodes. By decentralizing the network, the attestation is unpredictable, preventing malicious data injection. The performance of USAS is estimated in terms of node compromise detection rate.

TORP: TinyOS Opportunistic Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks

We introduce TORP — TinyOS Opportunistic Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). The main motivation is that when a data packet is transmitted, the multiple relay nodes cooperatively select the one which is closest to the destination node to continue forwarding the data packet. TORP attempts to save energy versus traditional deterministic routing protocols by selecting the next forwarding node dynamically based on the results of the packet delivery to neighboring nodes. We present the details of TORP design to illustrate how to select the next forwarding nodes by avoiding duplicate packet transmissions. Utilizing TelosB motes, we compare the performance of TORP against the Collection Tree Protocol. We present the performance results and the in-depth analysis in terms of throughput, hops per transmission, and power consumption.

Utilizing semantic caching in ubiquitous environment

Semantic caching is a dynamic caching strategy which deals with not only exact but also inexact similar queries. In this manner, each query will be carefully analyzed by the cache manager to identify the part that can be found in the cache from the part that needs to be retrieved from the server. This trimming process not only speeds up information retrieval but also saves on communication cost especially for mobile and wireless devices. Therefore, query trimming is a key problem in mobile and wireless environment, and devices in this environment have limited connection time, bandwidth, and battery power. However, the existing methods for query trimming have a number of limitations such as, inefficiency in time, space and the complexity of the algorithm used for trimming. These factors restrict the applicability of semantic caching for many applications. In this paper we investigate the shortcomings of query trimming process and propose a new solution to improve this process.

Hot spot aware energy efficient clustering approach for Wireless Sensor Networks

Energy efficiency is a major design goal for resource-constraint Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). In this paper, an energy efficient clustering approach is employed to meet this design goal. Moreover, given the fact that most of the existing clustering algorithms do not address the hot spot problem that arises in the vicinity of the base station, an unequal clustering mechanism is implemented among nodes at different distances from the base station. In this way, the hot spot problem is mitigated by evenly distributing energy consumption in WSNs. We further use simulation to carry out performance evaluation and present analysis.

Why it is Hard to Fight against Cyber Criminals

We are witnessing numerous cyber attacks every day, however, we do not see many cyber criminals are brought to justice. One reason is that it is technically hard to identify and trace cyber criminals. One reason for this passive situation is our limited or even inappropriate understanding of the cyber space. In this paper, we survey the challenges and opportunities in this research field for interested readers. We also list promising tools and directions based on our understanding.