A novel protocol to prevent malicious nodes from misdirecting forward ants in AntNet algorithm

Authors:
Mohsen Saffarian;Matei Ciobanu Morogan
Affiliations:
Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Kista, Sweden;Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Kista, Sweden
Venue:
Proceedings of the 2008 ACM symposium on Applied computing
Year:
2008

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Abstract

AntNet is an adaptive multi-agent routing algorithm inspired by ants' behavior, which can be used for the management of highly dynamic networks such as internet and wireless networks. Making use of their ability to autonomously migrate from one node to another, AntNet's forward ants explore the current condition of the network and then backward ants update the routing information stored on each node accordingly [3]. Although in comparison with other routing algorithms, AntNet have a better performance, especially regarding the load balancing factor, they are vulnerable against several security threats [8]. One important security threat is that a malicious node (router) can easily misdirect a forward ant to a node which is not located in the best path towards the destination node of that ant. In this paper this threat is precisely described and a protocol to mitigate it is suggested and to some extent analyzed. It is important to note that this threat arises from the nature of free-roaming mobile agents and thus, it exists in other routing algorithms utilizing such agents as well.