Packet Scheduling In Energy Harvesting And Security Issues In Wireless Networking

Symmetric Key Cryptography and Encryption Algorithms

Question:

Discuss About The Packet Scheduling In An Energy Harvesting?

DES: Data Encryption Standard or DES is considered to be a symmetric key algorithm. The block cipher here is of 64 bits. It has the ability to encrypt exactly 64 bits of data at a single time. Presently it is known as AES. The DES differs from stream cipher because it does not encrypt single bit at one time. This is a symmetric cryptography (ISLAM & AZAD, 2014). A cipher block called Fiestal block forms the basis of DES.  The size of key in this encryption standard is 56 bits but the actual key input is of 8 byte. It is known to be the main standard or form of symmetric algorithm.

Triple DES: Triple DES is a variation of the Data Encryption Standard. It is also known as EDE which means to encrypt then decrypt and again encrypt.  Three DES applications are used in triple DES (Barker & Barker, 2012). There are two DES keys that are independent in nature.  An effective key length is generated that is 168 bits long. The three keys are of size 168, 112 and 56 bits. The 56 bits key is used for first encryption, and then the 112 bits key is used for decryption. At the end the 168 bits key is used for encryption again (Bhanot & Hans, 2015). This is much more secured than the DES.

RC2: RC2 is considered to be a symmetric key block cipher that is of 64 bits. The keys used vary in length. The block cipher is iterated and its computation is a function of plaintext. There are two types of rounds present in RC2 (Alam & Khan, 2013).  RC2 is the optimized version of the DES. The cipher here is fast. The decryption and encryption operations are not equal. The keys are public. And it is a symmetric algorithm unlike the symmetric block cipher of DES and triple DES. It is vulnerable to security threats. There are sixteen mixing round and two mashing rounds.

Security Issues in Bluetooth: The Bluetooth network is vulnerable to several security risks and threats. A process by which hacker attacks or hacks a Bluetooth network is known as Bluesnarfing. This type of hacking accesses the detailed information present in the cell phones and wireless devices like photographs, contacts and other sensitive data (Minar & Tarique, 2012). This occurs in a silent manner and the user is unable to understand. There are threats of another hacking technique called backdoor hacking. Here a non trusted device can still access the information present in another mobile device. Bluejacking is a major threat in the Bluetooth technology and networks (Padgette, 2017). Here the attacker renames their own device and during the process of pairing with another device it influences the victim’s device to pair it with them. Suppose the name of the attacker device is “Click accept for winning $500”. Then in this case the victim can click access. This allows the hacker to get access to the victim’s device. There are also other risks like virus and worms attack. Malware can harm the mobile device.

Security Issues in Bluetooth

Security Issues in ZigBee: ZigBee is considered to be a standard that is used for wireless networking. There are various kinds of attacks associated with ZigBee. Consider a device containing ZigBee radio in it and if an attacker who has huge knowledge about it is able to access the device physically then it is known as the physical attack. Here the attacker targets the encryption key of the device (Zillner & Strobl, 2015). Another category of threat is called key attacks. Here the attacker tries to gain access to a device from a remote location. It also tries to obtain the encryption key. This attack can take place by imitating a node on the network of ZigBee (Wang, Jiang & Zhang, 2014). There is another type of attack or threat where the attack is on the key but it also uses the packet replay attack or injection attacks. It attempts to trick the device in order to perform an unauthorized activity or action. These types of security issues are present because of the protocols that are light weight in design.

Harvesting of energy can be done from the natural resources like thermal energy, solar energy as well as kinetic energy. After deriving the energy it is stored for the purpose of small and wireless devices like the sensor networks that are wireless. This energy harvesting concept helps to conserve energy and it utilizes or consumes small range of power for those electronics that need low energy.

If the wireless devices are incorporated with the capability to harvest energy then it will enable every node in the wireless networks to acquire energy in a continuous manner. This energy harvesting concept will be responsible for a great future of wireless networks. A wireless network that will harvest energy will introduce numerous changes in the concept and operation of wireless networking (Ulukus et al., 2015).  There are several benefits that are expected because of the energy harvesting concept.  The consumption of conventional energy will become less. Wireless networks will be able to get deployed in remote locations like the rural and village areas. The energy harvesting technologies are solar and indoor lighting along with electromagnetic and thermal energies. Energy harvesting can be done from human made sources where the energy transfer takes place among various nodes over wireless medium. This can be done in a controlled procedure.  Every technology involved has a different level of capability along with different level of efficiency. The concept of engineering has been used in order to improve the mechanism of energy harvesting in a continuous manner. It also improves the process of communication in a wireless network. New dimensions are added to the problems of wireless communications. There is intermittency as well as randomness in the availability of energy. There is also intermittency as well as randomness in the energy sharing possibility that can take place in the nodes present in the wireless network.  All these present a new dimension to the protocols that are applied in the several layers like medium access, physical as well as networking layer. The information theoretic concept of harvesting energy uses AWGN channel and the concept of Guassian noise. The output of this concept is the addition of input X and noise N. The problems of communication using energy harvesting can be solved by certain communication theories as well as networking approaches. The single channel optimization faces a constraint called energy casualty.  The solution provided here aims at keeping the power periods at the longest stretch in a continuous manner. In case of multiple access channel, directional as well as generalized water-filling along with iterative water-filling techniques are used in a combined manner in order to get a management scheme that is optimum. Devices that have the capability to harvest energy can send packets of data based on the policy of transmission (Yang & Ulukus, 2012). There are issues relating to code designs as well. There are certain challenges in harvesting energy in wireless networks. There are chances of improvements in the process of transferring energy. There are challenges regarding the understanding of the interdisciplinary nature associated with wireless networks and energy harvesting concept. It mainly focuses on the integration of devices and circuits that harvest as well as transfer energy.

Security Issues in ZigBee

Wireless Sensor Networks are gaining importance with time. The major drawback of this technology is that only limited amount of energy is associated with it. This limitation is trying to be resolved by designing and developing high performance and energy efficient systems that are used for the purpose of energy harvesting. There are two main sources of energy called the external and ambient sources (Shaikh & Zeadally, 2016). Ambient sources are available in the nature very easily and with least cost. Explicit sources are explicitly deployed for the purpose harvesting energy. In the method of radio frequency harvesting, radio waves get transformed into DC power (Lu et al., 2015). In the process of thermal harvesting technique, the heat energy is transformed into electric energy. Other forms of ambient sources include solar, wind and hydro energy. The use of solar energy would be very effective in case of solving the WSN issues and problems. The moving water generates energy and it is an effective method of harvesting energy.

Wind energy is also very important for the purpose of resolving the issues in WSN. External sources of energy consider certain methods like mechanical harvesting and human based harvesting. The mechanical harvesting technique uses the electrostatic, piezoelectric as well as the electromagnetic mechanisms for harvesting energy. The variations in the pressure are converted into energy. To monitor the physiological nature of a human certain sensor nodes are put inside or on the body of the human. These harvest energy from the locomotive movement of the humans. Energy harvesting models can be designed by taking into consideration two main factors like rate and amount of energy harvested. The characteristics of the models will differ based on the sources of energy. There are certain challenges like energy generation from several sources, prediction as well as designing reliable systems that are energy efficient. The storage of energy is also another challenge. Energy harvesting is extremely important for the future development and deployment of WSN. Every energy source is associated with a different capability. Based on the capabilities, the harvesting models are designed. There are still many challenges that are not identified.

References

Alam, M. I., & Khan, M. R. (2013). Performance and efficiency analysis of different block cipher algorithms of symmetric key cryptography. International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science and Software Engineering, 3(10).

Barker, W. C., & Barker, E. B. (2012). SP 800-67 Rev. 1. Recommendation for the Triple Data Encryption Algorithm (TDEA) Block Cipher.

Bhanot, R., & Hans, R. (2015). A review and comparative analysis of various encryption algorithms. International Journal of Security and Its Applications, 9(4), 289-306.

ISLAM, E., & AZAD, S. (2014). data encryption standard. Practical Cryptography: Algorithms and Implementations Using C++, 57.

Lu, X., Wang, P., Niyato, D., Kim, D. I., & Han, Z. (2015). Wireless networks with RF energy harvesting: A contemporary survey. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, 17(2), 757-789.

Minar, N. B. N. I., & Tarique, M. (2012). Bluetooth security threats and solutions: a survey. International Journal of Distributed and Parallel Systems, 3(1), 127.

Padgette, J. (2017). Guide to bluetooth security. NIST Special Publication, 800, 121.

Shaikh, F. K., & Zeadally, S. (2016). Energy harvesting in wireless sensor networks: A comprehensive review. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 55, 1041-1054.

Ulukus, S., Yener, A., Erkip, E., Simeone, O., Zorzi, M., Grover, P., & Huang, K. (2015). Energy harvesting wireless communications: A review of recent advances. IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, 33(3), 360-381.

Wang, C., Jiang, T., & Zhang, Q. (Eds.). (2014). ZigBee® network protocols and applications. CRC Press.

Yang, J., & Ulukus, S. (2012). Optimal packet scheduling in an energy harvesting communication system. IEEE Transactions on Communications, 60(1), 220-230.

Zillner, T., & Strobl, S. (2015). ZigBee exploited: The good the bad and the ugly.