Guest Editorial
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| Title | Guest Editorial |
| Authors | |
| Abstract | Wireless communication weaknesses are on the increase due to the emergence of advanced services, the need of roaming, and the large deployment of mobile technologies. This has created challenging issues in the security of wireless systems and applications operating in wireless environments. The objectives of this special issue are three-fold: (a) to seek for the development of new techniques, models and theories that are able to support better protection of the mobile and wireless communication systems; (b) to assess and enhance the level of security of the current wireless communication systems, services and networks; and (c) to promote new techniques, such as digital investigation, multimedia protection, risk analysis, intrusion detection and response to incidents, that are able to provide a panoply of efficient security services.Seven Papers have been selected for the special issue. They address seven major research issues, namely, the digital investigation in wireless communications, security of vehicular wireless communication, security level estimation mechanism for mobile ad hoc networks, charging AAA functionalities for new-generation integrated mobile services, wireless tracking systems, and testing of applications in wireless sensor networks.The first paper addresses digital investigation of security incidents in the context of wireless networks, such as the mobile ad hoc networks (MANet). Obviously, the existing schemes developed for investigating wireline networks are unable to address the mobility of attackers, the lack of infrastructure, and the evidence collection in hostile wireless environments. Starting from the fact that, to cope with multihop systems, such as MANets, digital investigation schemes require cooperative mechanisms and techniques for evidence collection and analysis, the paper proposes a framework for digital investigation of security incidents in the context of MANet. It sets up a cooperative observation network, composed of randomly distributed investigator nodes, to monitor nodes mobility, topology variation, and patterns of executed actions. A set of techniques to aggregate, merge, and analyze evidences is proposed to reconstruct potential attack scenarios and identify the paths used to transfer packets launching the attacks.In the second paper, Nilsson and Larson address the emerging trend that aim at introducing wireless technology in the vehicle domain by attaching a wireless gateway to the in-vehicle network. By allowing wireless communication, real-time information exchange between vehicles and between infrastructure and vehicles become reality. This communication allows for road condition reporting, decision making, and remote diagnostics and firmware updates over-the-air. However, allowing external parties wireless access to the in-vehicle network creates a potential entry-point for cyber attackers. In this paper, the authors investigate the security issues of allowing external wireless communication. They use a defense-in-depth perspective and discuss security challenges and propose solutions for attack prevention and detection, and forensics needs. In the third paper, Savola and Abie propose an integrated security measurement architecture and framework for a dynamic self-organizing monitoring system based on mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs), structured according to currently known security challenges. The aim of this framework is to predict and monitor the security performance, and to assess and calculate the degree of the trustworthiness of and confidence in the security measurement of the overall security level of the system as a whole, while concentrating on the principal effects contributing to it. The authors introduce an on-the-fly security level estimation mechanism for MANETs. The mechanism can be used to support node-level, network segment-level and network-level decision making. At the node level, it is possible to constantly estimate the security level when choosing applications and communication mechanisms. At the network level, democratic voting among independent estimates originating from different nodes is used to increase the level of security. Additionally, the authors introduce a generic security evaluation framework based on the definition and decomposition of security requirements, behavior modeling, evidence collection, and decision making. The goal of the decision making process is to make an assessment of and form conclusions about the information security level or performance of the system under investigation.In the fourth paper Palmieri considers the scenario of an integrated mobile communication environment enabling service deployment and content delivery offered by independent providers through heterogeneous network infrastructures. The author establishes that in this scenario there is a strong need for a common charging and billing scheme enhancing access flexibility and encouraging services and network convergence. The author proposes, starting from an AAA-based 3G-WLAN roaming/interworking paradigm, a unified “one stop” charging scheme, according to which the customers will receive a single itemized bill for all consumed services regardless of the providing party and access technology. Such a platform can become very helpful for the homogeneous development of charging functionalities for new-generation integrated mobile services.In the fifth paper Abdelkader et al propose a tracking framework applicable in sensitive regions where a number of sensor nodes are scattered to detect the presence of intruders and forward subsequent events to the analysis center(s). The approach is based on Voronoi tessellations and proposes two mobility models to control the coverage degree according to target presence. The objective is to set a non-uniform coverage within the monitored zone to allow detecting the target(s) by multiple sensor nodes. The authors show how the proposed method adapts to the situation where multiple targets move in the monitored zone. Moreover, they design an algorithm to discover redundant nodes (which do not provide additional information about target position). The approach is shown to be effective in reducing the energy consumption using an activity scheduling approach. The authors carried out simulations to underline the efficiency of the proposed models and checked that the sensor deployment guarantees an optimal event detection rate.In the sixth paper Mozundar et al considers the data aggregation in wireless sensor networks to eliminate redundancy, improve bandwidth utilization, and energy efficiency of sensor nodes. The aggregation assumes that one node, called the cluster leader, collects data from surrounding nodes and then sends the summarized information to upstream nodes. This paper proposes an algorithm to select a cluster leader that will perform data aggregation in a partially connected sensor network. The algorithm reduces the traffic flow inside the network by adaptively selecting the shortest route for packet routing to the cluster leader. The authors also describe a simulation framework for functional analysis of WSN applications taking the proposed algorithm as an example.In the seventh paper Al Saad et al introduce a tool-suite that facilitates automated testing of applications for wireless sensor networks assuming that WSNs are highly distributed systems and require a testing infrastructure. The authors present a general-purpose testing framework which enables component, integration, and system testing. To coordinate the execution of the modules implementing test cases, synchronization code must be written which is a complex and time consuming task. To bypass this task, and thus make the test case implementation process more efficient, the authors introduce a model-driven approach that delegates this task to the code generator. Thereto, the test scenario is represented in a model and the code of the modules is generated. This model also eases the task of isolating faults in the code of the application being tested because the model can be refined to get insights on the application’s behavior to backtrack the cause of the failure reproduced by the test case.Finally, the special issue guest editors would like to thank the authors for their interesting contributions and the quality of their results, the reviewers for their high quality evaluation, and the editor in chief and the executive editor of JNW for their professional skills and support. |
| Publisher | ACADEMY PUBLISHER |
| Date | 2009-09-01 |
| Source | Journal of Networks Vol 4, No 7 (2009): Special Issue: Security of Wireless Communication Systems |
| Rights | Copyright © ACADEMY PUBLISHER - All Rights Reserved.To request permission, please check out URL: http://www.academypublisher.com/copyrightpermission.html. |