Decorrelating wireless sensor network traffic to inhibit traffic analysis attacks

Typical packet traffic in a sensor network reveals pronouncedpatterns that allow an adversary analyzing packet traffic to deduce the location of a base station. Once discovered, the base station can be destroyed, rendering the entire sensor network inoperative, since a base station is a central point of data collection and hence failure. This paper investigates a suite of decorrelation countermeasures aimed at disguising the location of a base station against traffic analysis attacks. A set of basic countermeasures is described, including hop-by-hop reencryption of the packet to change its appearance, imposition of a uniform packet sending rate, and removal of correlation between a packet's receipt time and its forwarding time. More sophisticated countermeasures are described that introduce randomness into the path taken by a packet. Packets may also fork into multiple fake paths to further confuse an adversary. A technique is introduced to create multiple random areas of high co...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: PERCOM
• Authors: Jing Deng, Richard Han, Shivakant Mishra
• Keywords: Adversary Analyzing Packet, Base Station, PERCOM 2006, Typical Packet Traffic, Wireless Networks