Position verification for vehicular networks via analyzing two-hop neighbors information

Vehicular networks will enable vehicles on the road to utilize wireless communication to exchange safety information; enhancing traffic flow and minimizing accidents. With vehicle positions being the most frequently exchanged information in vehicular networks; it becomes imperative to establish a strong level of trust in the announced positions before a vehicle may take action in response. This paper proposes a position verification scheme that involves the collaborative exchange of one-hop neighbor information in order to help a vehicle make better judgments of position announcements. Vehicles can assess neighborhood connectivity and use the logical traffic flow to form a verdict on trusting a position announcement, thus enabling the detection of possible position falsifications. The scheme analyzes accumulated 2-hop neighbors\´ information in order to define a plausibility area within which a vehicle should exist in order for its position to be considered "correct". In very sparse traffic scenarios, a vehicle will depend on measuring the consistency of a vehicle\´s Received Signal Strength (RSS) with its announced position. Performance evaluation was carried out via simulation, and results show that defining this plausibility area yields accurate detection of position falsifications with low false positives.