Securing underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) against cyber-attacks
Research Opportunities
Summary
It consists of various kinds of sensors, robots and vehicles that can be deployed in remote and hazardous deep-water zones for remote monitoring and operation in different application areas such as real-time monitoring and remote control of ROVs in the off-shore oil industry, resource discovery , disaster detection and early warning; or sense light, salinity, pressure, temperature, density, chemical components, conductivity, pH or turbidity etc) [1].
While UWSN is a hot topic in exploring and studying the underwater world, there are many challenges involved in its proper performance, including unpredicted underwater environment, data transfer, and vulnerability to a wide class of security threats and malicious attacks [2]. To avoid these attacks, the security requirements of UWSNs must be evaluated. Therefore, efforts are needed on fundamental research for the development of new advanced secure communication techniques for efficient underwater communication and networking. This work investigates the development of new advanced secure communication techniques for underwater communication and networking.
The project mainly focuses on real time communication between underwater wireless sensor nodes and onshore servers exchanging data and images via radio, acoustic and optical means via a secured communication method [2]. There are two parts of this study: the design of UWSN network and underwater data communication, and the evaluation and mitigation of attacks and threats against such communication.
Performing underwater wireless sensor networking experiments in the field on real hardware is expensive, therefore, the investigation on underwater communication network design will be conducted via simulation.
References
- Pompili, D. and Akyildiz, I.F., A cross-layer communication solution for multimedia applications in underwater acoustic sensor networks. In Mobile Ad Hoc and sensor systems. MASS 2008. 5th IEEE International Conference on (pp. 275-284),2008.
- Guang Yang, Lie Dai, Guannan Si, Shuxin Wang, Shouqiang Wang, Challenges and Security Issues in Underwater Wireless Sensor Networks, Procedia Computer Science,Volume 147, 2019.
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