Increasing the DoS attack resiliency in military ad hoc networks

This paper investigates resiliency of three ad hoc routing protocols against the range attack. This denial of service (DoS) attack has not been described in the literature before. It is based on modifying the transmission range of a wireless node periodically which causes continuous changes in the topology of an ad hoc network. The range attack does not require a node to be compromised. An enemy only has to get close enough to a node to attenuate or amplify radio signal. The research methodology is based on using the ns-2 network simulator to analyze the transmission delay in a small ad hoc network. An enemy uses one of the nodes to carry out the range attack. The following ad hoc routing protocols were compared: the destination-sequenced distance-vector (DSDV), the ad hoc on-demand distance-vector (AODV), and the dynamic source routing (DSR) protocols. According to the simulation results, DSDV provides the best resiliency against the range attack when the primary application requires a very short transmission delay less or equal to 0.1 seconds. When the primary application tolerates delays up to 2 seconds, AODV provides the best resiliency against the range attack. Defense mechanisms are thus situation dependent. A control system is required to change defense mechanisms, if application requirements change