Node Cooperation in Hybrid Ad Hoc Networks

  • Authors:
  • Naouel Ben Salem;Levente Buttyan;Jean-Pierre Hubaux;Markus Jakobsson

  • Affiliations:
  • IEEE;-;IEEE;-

  • Venue:
  • IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing
  • Year:
  • 2006

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Abstract

A hybrid ad hoc network is a structure-based network that is extended using multihop communications. Indeed, in this kind of network, the existence of a communication link between the mobile station and the base station is not required: A mobile station that has no direct connection with a base station can use other mobile stations as relays. Compared with conventional (single-hop) structure-based networks, this new generation can lead to a better use of the available spectrum and to a reduction of infrastructure costs. However, these benefits would vanish if the mobile nodes did not properly cooperate and forward packets for other nodes. In this paper, we propose a charging and rewarding scheme to encourage the most fundamental operation, namely packet forwarding. We use "MAC layering” to reduce the space overhead in the packets and a stream cipher encryption mechanism to provide "implicit authentication” of the nodes involved in the communication. We analyze the robustness of our protocols against rational and malicious attacks. We show that—using our solution—collaboration is rational for selfish nodes. We also show that our protocols thwart rational attacks and detect malicious attacks.