Ad hoc networks: Overview, applications and routing issues

Kristoffer Karlsson IT3 Billy Ho IT3 Chalmers University of Technology kriskarl@student.chalmers.se, illy@student.chalmers.se Abstract This !a!er intends to give an introduction to ad hoc net"orks in general. The follo"ing to!ics "ill e discussed# The definition of ad hoc net"orks and its a!!lications, moreover the !a!er dives a it dee!er into ho" routing is handled in ad hoc net"orks and descri es a cou!le of different routing methods. The !a!er discusses routing methods from t"o different !ers!ectives !osition ased and ada!tive in each of these t"o categories it descri es a cou!le of different methods in more detail. $inally the !a!er riefly discusses security issues related to routing !rotocols this is intended to give the reader a glance of "hich security issues arises in the design of ad hoc net"orks. Keywords# %d hoc net"orks, %d hoc net"ork routing, %d hoc net"ork a!!lications, %da!tive routing, &osition ased routing, %d hoc routing !rotocol attacks. 1. Introduction The ra!id gro"th of Internet has made communication an integrated and highly im!ortant factor of com!uting. In today's society "ith the develo!ment of mo ile devices it has ecome im!ortant to stay online all the time. In order to stay online all the time it must e !ossi le to set u! a net"ork fast and cost effective "hen moving et"een different infrastructures, ad hoc net"orks deals "ith this kinds of issues. $urthermore in military o!erations or after environment disaster it is im!ortant to esta lish communication fast in addition it is highly !ro a le the e(isting infrastructure has een destroyed. %fter the ad hoc net"ork has een esta lished the nodes that connect the net"ork might move, say for e(am!le that one military s)uad is under heavy attack and has to esca!e. In ad hoc net"orks nodes should e a le to move freely and the information should e routed through ne" !aths after old ones have een roken, the net"ork should also e a le to handled clustering. The advent of ad hoc net"ork has given irth to ne" kinds of routing algorithms and ne" security threats.

*ore com!lications arise in ad hoc "ireless net"orks ecause the com!onents usually have much lo"er ca!acity than their "ired counter!arts, this gives makes congestion and overload common rather than an e(ce!tion "hich it is in "ired net"orks. +ue to the fact that ad hoc net"orks should e !ossi le to esta lish in tough conte(t, factors such as noise and distur ance !lay a ma,or role in the design. 2. De inition %d hoc is defined as -%rranged or ha!!ening "hen necessary and not !lanned in advanced. according to o(fords advanced learners dictionary. This gives an e(!lanation of "hat ad hoc net"orks are is to say net"orks set u! on the fly for a s!ecial !ur!ose. $urthermore ad hoc net"orks are usually such net"orks that are set u! for one time occurrences such as conferences or military o!erations. This can e !ara!hrased into the follo"ing definition an ad hoc net"ork is a fle(i le and ada!tive net"ork "ith no fi(ed infrastructure. !. Applications %d hoc net"ork has many a!!lications t"o of them are already mentioned is to say crisis management and military o!erations. %nother a!!lication is Bluetooth "hich is designed for !ersonal use and ena les !rinters, scanners, mo ile !hones and music !layers to e connected "ireless to a !ersonal area net"ork this creates a tremendous fle(i ility ecause it ena les devices to move freely et"een different net"orks. %d hoc net"orks can also e used in the multi !layer game, one can imagine a game !layed from a device that can esta lish communication "ith other near y devices, and these devices can then esta lish a cluster of interconnected devices and use this as a !latform for !laying the game. There are many im!lementations of ad hoc net"orks one of them is today's la!to!s e)ui!!ed "ith /01.22 "ireless &CI cards, they esta lish an ad hoc net"ork, if the ad hoc mode is activated. This is es!ecially useful for usiness meetings in !laces "here no current infrastructure is availa le say for e(am!le on an ad hoc conference in for e(am!le a restaurant. If those taking !art "ishes to share data such as re!orts, diagrams and statistics they can activate their ad hoc mode and effortlessly transmit the data. This has !roven e(tremely useful and com!letely eliminates the need for ca le and routers. ". #outing There are many routing algorithms. &osition Based 3outing, %da!tive 3outing and 4%$%3 "ill e discussed here. In &osition Based 3outing and %da!tive 3outing, there are different routing a!!roaches. ".1. $osition %ased #outing

Here routing in "hich a !acket is to e sent from a source node to a destination node in a given "ireless net"ork "ill e considered. The destination node is kno"n and addressed y means of its location. 3outing is !erformed y a scheme ased on this information. The distance et"een t"o neigh our nodes can e estimated on the asis of incoming signal strengths. 3elative coordinates of neigh our nodes can e o tained y e(changing such information et"een neigh ours. &osition ased routing could e used in "ireless local area net"ork, !acket radio net"orks, home and office net"orks and sensor net"orks. 5s!ecially "ireless sensor net"orks, "hich "ill likely e "idely de!loyed in the near future ecause they greatly e(tend our a ility to monitor and control the !hysical environment from remote locations. There are several classes of e(isting !osition ased routing schemes. 4ome of the "ill e descri ed. &rogress and +irection Based *ethods 6iven a transmitting node 4, the !rogress of a node % is defined as the !ro,ection onto the line connecting 4 and the final destination of the distance et"een 4 and the receiving node. % !rogress is !ositive if the ne(t routing ste! is in for"ard direction, other"ise the !rogress is negative. Basic +istance, &rogress and +irection Based *ethods use these conce!ts to select the ne(t routing ste!. There are different "ays to route !ackets. 7ne "ay is the *$3 8*ost $or"ard "ithin 3adius9 routing algorithm, in "hich !acket is routed to the ne(t ste! "ith the greatest !rogress. %nother "ay is to use the com!ass routing method, called the +I3 method. In this method, the source or intermediate node % uses the location information of the destination + to calculate its direction. The !acket is for"arded to the ne(t node C, such that the direction %C is closest to direction %+. This !rogress re!eats until destination is reached. % variant of greedy algorithm, called 65+I3, could also e used, "here the message is dro!!ed if the est choice for a current node is to return the message to the node the message came from. That indicates that a failure has occurred. 6reedy routing is usually a !art of other routing schemes. $or instance, it is used in several location u!date schemes. &artial $looding In directional flooding: ased methods, a node % sends a message to many nodes "here the direction from % to any of these nodes is closest to the direction of the destination +. In order to control the flooding, it is re)uired that nodes can memori;e !ast traffic and to

avoid for"arding the same message more than once. 4ome methods that elong to this class are +35%* and <%3. $looding can e !artial ecause it is directed to"ards nodes in a limited sector of the net"ork and can only e used for !ath discovery or for !acket for"arding. In +35%*, the message is for"arded to all neigh our nodes "hose direction elongs to the selected range. +35%* uses a limited flooding of location u!date messages. In <%3 8location aided routing9, the source or an intermediate node % "ill for"ard the message to all nodes that are closer to the destination than %. +e!th $irst 4earch Based 3outing In 63% 8geogra!hic routing algorithm9, nodes are re)uired to !artially store routes to"ards certain destinations in the routing ta les. 63% a!!lies greedy strategies in for"arding messages. If a node 4 discovers that it is closer to the destination node + than any of its neigh our, it starts a route discovery !rotocol. The route discovery !rotocol tries to find a !ath from 4 to + and u!dates the routing ta les to"ards + at any intermediate nodes "ith this information. There are t"o route discovery strategies, readth first search 8e)uivalent to flooding9 and de!th first search 8+$49. In +$4, each node !uts its name and address on the route discovery !acket, and then it for"ards it to a neigh our node "ho has not seen the !acket efore. If a node can not for"ard the !acket, it removes its name and address from the !acket and returns the !acket to the node that for"arded to this node. 5ach node acce!ts a given !acket only once in the for"ard mode 8also acce!ts the same !acket if returned to it9. Hierarchical 3outing 7ne of the main strategies used to com ine nodes location and hierarchical net"ork structures are the =one Based 3outing. In =one Based 3outing, nodes "ithin a ;one u!date their location et"een themselves regularly and a!!ly the shortest !ath routes et"een them. 5ach node records the location of each ;one, y treating each ;one as a destination. If a message is not sent to a destination "ithin the same ;one, the sender "ill send route re)uests to each of the ;one. The ;one that contains the destination re!lies "ith e(act coordinates of the destination ack to the sender node. The sender node then learns the !ath to the destination and sends the full message to"ards the destination. %ssisted 3outing In %ssisted 3outing, a node can count on the assistance of some other nodes called friends, i.e. some nodes hel! other nodes in !erforming their routing tasks. The net"ork is re!resented as a large gra!h, "here edges corres!ond to the .friend relationshi!.. % node 4 is a friend of node T if T thinks that it has a good !ath to node 4 and T decides to kee! 4 in its -friend list.. The resulting gra!h is highly clustered "ith a num er of shortcuts. >hen a node is selected for eing a colla orative node, the shortcuts are

effective for the routing tasks, and in !articular for selecting !aths. >hen a source node 4 "ants to find a !ath to destination node +, it re)uests assistance from some friend node. If the friend is in condition to colla orate, it tries to !rovide node 4 "ith some !ath to + 8"ith or "ithout colla oration of its o"n friends, de!ending on it already has the !ath or not9.

".2. Adaptive #outing 7n:demand routing is im!ortant for mo ile devices to communicate in a "ireless net"ork. 4ince devices in an ad hoc net"ork ,oins and leaves the net"ork at "ill and in a totally asynchronous manner. Thus, it is im!ortant that a "ireless net"ork can !rovide .anytime any"here. com!utation due to its ro ustness and inherent fault:tolerance. There are t"o ma,or classes of ad hoc routing !rotocols, reactive on:demand and !roactive ta le: ased. &roactive ta le: ased !rotocols are inefficient in the sense that it re)uires !eriodic u!date of the routing information stored in the routing ta les, even "hen there is no data traffic. 7ne advantage "ith !roactive ta le: ased !rotocols, com!ared to reactive on:demand !rotocols, is that the set u! delay for a data transfer is e(!ected to e shorter ecause a route is already stored in the ta le for use. But ho"ever, the route stored in the ta le may no longer e(ist or have ecome unusa le "hen the actual data transfer is to e taken !lace. It could e due to the mo ility of the mo ile device in the net"ork, i.e. its geogra!hical locations may have een changed "hen a data transfer is re)uired, meaning that a !reviously set u! route useless. %nother reason could e that the )uality of the channels among the mo ile devices is inevita ly time:varying making the links in a route no longer usea le, even though the geogra!hical locations do not changed much. 4tate:of:the:%rt &rotocols %B3 8%ssociativity Based 3outing9 is a source:initiated on:demand routing !rotocol. % mo ile device does not need to kee! a route to every other device. %B3 is different from other !rotocols in the sense that the route is not chosen "ith shortest:!ath, ut on a long: lived asis. This makes the route more ro ust 8not easy to reak due to mo ility9 and the maintenance of route "ill ecome easier 8num er of route reconstruct messages is reduced, "hich means that the routing overhead is reduced and more and"idth is saved9. The essence of %B3 is that as a mo ile device moves, its associativity "ith the neigh our devices also changes. In %B3, each mo ile device !eriodically transmits .hello messages. to other devices to signify its e(istence. >hen these .hello messages. are received y its neigh our devices, it causes the associativity to increase et"een the sending and receiving devices. The greater the the associativity is, the more sta le of this device "ill e. ?ote that a high associativity of the device means a lo" mo ility of the device.

%7+@ 8%d:hoc 7n:+emand +istance @ector9 is a reactive on:demand !rotocol. In this !rotocol, each device does not need kno" a route to every other device. It does not need to !eriodically e(change route information "ith neigh our devices. 7nly "hen a mo ile device has !ackets to send to a destination does it need to discover and maintain a route to that destination device. In %7+@, each device has a route ta le for a destination. The route ta le stores destination address, se)uence num er, active neigh ours, and e(!iration time for the ta le. 5(!iration time is u!dated each time the route is used. If the route has not een used for a s!ecified !eriod of time, it "ill e discarded. <ink 4tate 3outing !rotocol "as originally designed for "ireline net"orks. In this !rotocol, each mo ile device has its o"n vie" of the net"ork. >hen a mo ile device "ants to for"ard a !acket, it uses the shortest:!ath algorithm to find the ne(t ho! to for"ard the !acket to its destination. Thus, each mo ile device must kee! an u!:to:date vie" of the net"ork. >hen a mo ile device finds that a link cost has changed "ith one of its neigh our devices, it "ill flood this change throughout the "hole net"ork. Thus, all other mo ile devices "ill eventually u!date its vie" of the net"ork. In +4+@ 8+estination 4e)uenced +istance @ector9 routing !rotocol, each device maintains a routing ta le containing entries for all the devices in the net"ork. In order to kee! the routing ta le com!letely u!dated at all time, each device !eriodically roadcasts routing message to its neigh our devices. >hen a neigh our device receives the roadcasted routing message and kno"s the current link cost to the device, it com!ares this value and the corres!onding value stored in its routing ta le. If changes "ere found, it u!dates the value and recom!utes the distance of the route "hich includes this link in the routing ta le. 3eceiver Initiated Channel:%da!tive 83IC%9 3outing The 3IC% !rotocol is a reactive on:demand algorithm. % source mo ile device does not !ermanently kee! a route to any destination. The source device "ill try to determine a route only "hen it has !ackets to send to a !articular destination. >hen a source device "ants to transmit a !acket, it first generates a route re)uest 8335A9 !acket. It then roadcast the 335A to all devices "ithin transmission range. ?eigh our devices "ill for"ard the 335A to other farther devices. This goes on until the 335A reaches the destination device. The destination device then generates a route re!ly 8335&9 and unicasts it along the selected route ack to the source device 8the selected route can e com!uted from 335A, "here a fields holds a list of all intermediate devices9. ".!. &A'A# 4%$%3 is a mo ile "ireless routing !rotocol for ad hoc net"orks it com ines oth !roactive and reactive routing descri ed a ove. +ue to the fact that most "ireless devices has lo"er ca!acity than "ired it takes a ne" a!!roach to routing and strives to ma(imi;e the usage of and"idth at every stage. The !rotocol uses a so called fitness: ased routing ta le "hich is that it takes into consideration "hen routing ho" fit is to say ho" good a

node is to route information through. The fitness of a node is dynamic hence it can change over time. 4%$%3 is uilt on the follo"ing assum!tion 2. 5very node has its o"n fitness information 1. %ll links are symmetric The !rotocol is ased on the fact that nodes "ith lo" and"idth should not have to handle the overhead needed to maintain a !ath, thus the lo" and"idth nodes use a reactive a!!roach. 7n the other hand the nodes "ith high and"idth use a !roactive a!!roach they send data et"een each other necessary to uild a !ath. The fitness of a node determines ho" many nodes it can maintain contact "ith. This architecture ena les the high and"idth node to take care of most of the communication and thus ma(imi;es the and"idth of the system and does not make the lo" and"idth nodes overloaded. This method is called hy rid ecause is uses oth !roactive and reactive. >hen routing !ackets 4%$%3 takes a t"o:stage a!!roach in the first stage the !rotocol tries to send the !acket through the e(isting infrastructure "hich has een esta lished !roactively, unless must nodes have very lo" fitness factor this "ill !ro a ly "ork if the nodes are in the same area. If the first stage fails the !rotocol "ill enter the second stage "hich here the !rotocol uses an a!!roach similar to the on:demand a!!roach descri e a ove. B1C (. Attacks on routing protocols The ty!es of attacks can roughly e divided into t"o ty!es, !assive attack and active attacks. In the former the attacker does not strive to ring the net"ork do"n instead the attacker eavesdro!s and gathers information. This information can later e used to launch an attack, this ty!e of attack is called active attack and it could e launched on a "eak node on the ad hoc net"ork, this attack could e everything from a denial of service attack to a mas)uerade attack. 7ne of the hardest attack to defend against is the denial of service attack this might make an ad hoc net"ork vulnera le if it de!ends on a single link for routing information et"een t"o clusters. %lthough in general ad hoc net"orks are fairly !rotected against denial of service attacks ecause they dynamically esta lishes ne" !aths if a node has een taken do"n. Besides from denial of service attacks there are other ty!es of attacks "hich !ose a threat to routing !rotocols. 7ne of them is attack y dro!!ing !acket, "hich is "hen a malicious node on the net"ork deli erately dro!s !ackets. This attack can e divided into t"o ty!es one is "hen the malicious node dro!s all !ackets, this is called lack holes. The other is "hen it is selective a out "hich !ackets it dro!s this is called grey holes. This attack is e(tremely hard to defend against ecause it is very difficult to detect. %nother dangerous active attack is the modification of control !acket fields attack. This attack alters the control !acket fields this can e e(tremely dangerous ecause if an attack like this is carried out !ro!erly it "ill create a ga! et"een the net"ork's current state and ho" the nodes !erceive the state of the net"ork. 7ne e(am!le of such attack is to modify the route se)uences num er, this attack idea is for a malicious node to advertise this it has the shortest !ath to the node of "hich !ackets it "ants the interce!t !ackets. 4o all node sent to that node "ill go through the malicious node thus it can read them.B3C

). *onclusions The fast !ace of "hich mo ile technology evolves "ill !ro a ly result in ne" demands. *any of those demands "ill !ro a ly e satisfied y the develo!ment of ro ust, effective and chea! ad hoc net"orks. These ne" technologies "ill make it !ossi le to esta lish ro ust net"ork on demand and no further e)ui!ment "ill e needed. %d hoc technologies "ill also !rove useful in situations "here the infrastructure has een destroyed. It may save life if a crisis management grou! fast can esta lish communication links and communicate "ith the outside "orld. Unfortunately develo!ing effective ad hoc net"orks is not an easy task, the routing algorithms are su ,ect to ne" !ro lems "hich must e solved. %s al"ays then com!uters communicate over an o!en medium it can e su ,ect to attacks many attacks are harder to defend against due to the dynamic structure of ad hoc net"orks.

+. #e erences B2C Diu;hen Cheng, Diao Huang, %d hoc "ireless net"orking, 4!ringerE 2 edition 8+ecem er 32, 10039 B1C Figar +oshi and &rahlad Kilam i, 4%$%3# %n %da!tive Band"idth:5fficient 3outing &rotocol for *o ile %d Hoc ?et"orks, 4ri @enkates"ara College of 5ngineering B3C 4iddhartha 6u!te, *ukesh 4inghal. 4ecure routing in mo ile "ireless ad hoc net"orks, +e!artment of Com!uter 4cience, University of Kentucky, <e(ington, KG H0I0/, U4%