Security of Wi-Fi on-board intra-vehicular communication: Field trials of tunnel scenario

Wireless communications are increasingly-often selected as a cable replacement for on-board vehicular networks. When a wireless technology implements safety critical application, cryptographic countermeasures are required. This paper describes the impact of security on intra-vehicular communication in a real tunnel scenario, e.g. for urban transit or mining vehicles where the usage of security is mandatory in order to maintain the system safety. The measurement campaign was carried out in a sport ski-tunnel using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) Wi-Fi modules. The objective was to understand the impact of overhead on security in a tunnel considering line-of-sight (LOS) and non-LOS (NLOS) scenarios. In addition, the study compared different solutions for security to evaluating lesser known protocols. These field trials showed that wireless security is feasible up to 300 m in NLOS without repeaters. Finally, the experiment presented confirms the effectiveness of the Host Identity Protocol when used as standalone or in combination with other security solution.