Robust Spectrum Decision Protocol against Primary User Emulation Attacks in Dynamic Spectrum Access Networks

We propose a spectrum decision protocol resilient to primary user emulation attacks (PUEA) in dynamic spectrum access networks. PUEA is a type of denial-of-service attack that can severely interfere with the spectrum sensing process and unfairly deprive legitimate secondary users of spectrum access. In this paper, we present a robust spectrum decision protocol that can mitigate PUEA using individual spectrum decisions made by secondary nodes in the network. In order to enable each secondary node to make an individual spectrum decision to detect PUEA, we first characterize the received power at good secondary user. This is done by using a flexible log-normal sum approximation. The received power thus characterized is used to determine the probability of successful PUEA on each secondary user, which is used to develop the proposed protocol. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed protocol can significantly reduce the probability of successful PUEA under Byzantine attacks (i.e., when the malicious users intentionally provide false spectrum decisions), while still following the spectrum evacuation etiquette.