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Transactions on Emerging Telecommunications Technologies

Physical layer security based on spread‐spectrum watermarking and jamming receiver

Simone Soderi, Lorenzo Mucchi, Matti Hämäläinen, Alessandro Piva, Jari Iinatti

Published Dec 19, 2016• 38 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Abstract Wireless communications' infrastructures are frequently selected as a cable replacement in many applications giving an immediate advantage on the wireless investment. However, the worldwide proliferation of wireless local area network (WLAN) imposed large investments on the network security. In the early days of Internet, its layered protocol stack did not consider security as a primary concern. Because then, a significant amount of literature has been published. This paper proposes a watermark‐based blind physical layer security utilizing a jamming receiver in conjunction with the spread spectrum watermarking technique. The outage probability of the secrecy capacity is analytically derived, regardless of the eavesdropper position. The theoretical analysis let us draw a secure region around the legitimate receiver. Results indicate how the watermark‐based blind physical layer security aims to be a valuable technique for deploying physical layer security. Authors utilized 2 performance metrics, the outage probability of secrecy capacity for assessing the secure communication effectiveness and the error probability for evaluating the watermark extraction process. Finally, the proposed protocol improves the secrecy capacity performance if compared with other protocols, and moreover, it has a lower energy consumption.

DOI
10.1002/ett.3142

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Abstract Wireless communications' infrastructures are frequently selected as a cable replacement in many applications giving an immediate advantage on the wireless investment. However, the worldwide proliferation of wireless local area network (WLAN) imposed large investments on the network security. In the early days of Internet, its layered protocol stack did not consider security as a primary concern. Because then, a significant amount of literature has been published. This paper proposes a watermark‐based blind physical layer security utilizing a jamming receiver in conjunction with the spread spectrum watermarking technique. The outage probability of the secrecy capacity is analytically derived, regardless of the eavesdropper position. The theoretical analysis let us draw a secure region around the legitimate receiver. Results indicate how the watermark‐based blind physical layer security aims to be a valuable technique for deploying physical layer security. Authors utilized 2 performance metrics, the outage probability of secrecy capacity for assessing the secure communication effectiveness and the error probability for evaluating the watermark extraction process. Finally, the proposed protocol improves the secrecy capacity performance if compared with other protocols, and moreover, it has a lower energy consumption.
The technological innovation has enabled the spread of safety-related systems in many domains, such as public transport, energy, and medical devices. In these applications, security is one of the primary concerns. This paper proposes a watermark-based blind physical layer security (WBPLSec) utilizing a jamming receiver in conjunction with spread spectrum watermarking technique. The outage probability of the secrecy capacity is analytically derived, regardless of the eavesdropper position. Results indicate the WBPLSec a valuable technique for deploying physical layer security creating a secure region around the receiver, such as the legitimate medical device.
Abstract The broadcast nature of radio propagation in wireless communication has been suspected as the loopholes of passive or active attacks by unauthorized users (eavesdroppers). The physical layer security techniques operate at the lowest stack of OSI layer against conventional cryptographic approaches, operating at the upper layer. However, techniques such as channel coding, power (directional antenna and artificial noise), and spread spectrum have been (and continuously) deployed to safeguard against sophisticated attacks. Most of these deployments are theoretical, and a few are enhanced for efficient security against an intruder. In this article, a boundary technique approach is proposed and applied to the physical layer to improve its secrecy‐capacity and subdue adversary effects at the legitimate receiver. Hybrid performance metrics were adopted, and a Monte Carlo simulation was performed. The result obtained using secrecy outage probability, secrecy‐capacity, and intercept‐probability show that our proposed techniques enhance the secret transmission between the main transmitter and legitimate receiver. The simulation results were compared with the analytical methods. It was found that the channel between the transmitter and the main receiver has a better signal‐to‐noise ratio than the corresponding eavesdropper's channel. Conclusively, performance of the proposed technique is validated for applications in emerging wireless communication systems.
Visible Light Communication (VLC) is a key technology for the sixth-generation (6G) wireless communication thanks to the possibility of using artificial environmental lights as a data transfer channel. Although VLC systems are more resistant against interference and less susceptible to security vulnerabilities like most wireless networks, VLC is even inherently susceptible to eavesdropping attacks. Moreover, since VLC is considered an enabling technology for 6G, specific mechanisms are needed to enforce data security. This paper considers improving the security of the next generation of wireless communications by using the Watermark Blind Physical Layer Security (WBPLSec) in VLCs. The main intuition is that RGB LEDs offer the possibility for Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) as a useful support for the Spread-Spectrum (SS) watermarking. In this paper, we propose an approach that aims at obtaining VLC Physical Layer Security (PLS) by combining watermarking with an RGB LED jamming. We provide a performance analysis of the proposed security architecture based on the secrecy capacity in terms of its existence and outage probability. We prove that WBPLSec can be used to significantly improve confidentiality in the next generation of wireless communications. The results offer the possibility of creating a secure region around the legitimate receiver by leveraging the jamming optical power.
In this study, the authors investigate the physical layer security performance over Rayleigh fading channels in the presence of impulsive noise, as encountered, for instance in smart grid environments. For this scheme, secrecy performance metrics are considered with and without destination assisted jamming at the eavesdropper's side. Specifically, they derive analytical expressions for the secrecy outage probability (SOP), at the legitimate receiver. Finally, numerical results are provided to verify the accuracy of the authors' derivations. From the obtained results, it is verified that the SOP, without destination assisted jamming, is flooring at high signal‐to‐noise‐ratio values and that it can be significantly improved with the use of jamming.
In this study, the authors consider secure communications in multiuser wireless networks where full‐duplex (FD) jamming operates to enhance physical layer security. The considered multiuser system is equipped with FD legitimate receivers in contrast to conventional frameworks where a half‐duplex (HD) receiver is at hand. This study investigates an alternative solution in which the authors take advantage of FD capability of the receivers to send jamming signals against the eavesdropper. Under these assumptions, the impact of self‐interference and channel interference on physical layer security is investigated. They derive the expressions of secrecy outage probability and ergodic secrecy rate in the proposed system. Two FD jammer selection schemes are proposed to further improve the security. In addition, they apply a reinforcement learning technology, called Q‐learning, to model the interaction between the source and multiple jamming users. The preliminary results show that the application of FD jamming and user selection scheme leads to a significant improvement in the wireless network security.
High level of security is essential in wireless communications multimedia applications. The last few years there has been an increase in research interest in the potential of the radio channel's physical properties to provide communications security. These research efforts investigate fading, interference, and path diversity to develop security techniques for implementation in wireless systems. In this paper, we propose an enhancement to existing physical layer security schemes, taking advantage of the characteristics of the OFDM technique. An OFDM symbol includes the pilot sub-carriers, essential for the pilot channel estimation process performed at the legitimate receiver. In this work we propose the positions of the sub-carriers to change on every OFDM symbol following a probability distribution known only to the legitimate transmitter and legitimate receiver. An eavesdropper receiver, does not have access to the information of the pilot sub-carriers positions so, it performs blind channel estimation. The theoretical analysis is based on the information theoretic problem formulation and is confirmed by simulations. The performance metrics used are the secrecy capacity, the outage probability, the channel mean square error and the bit error rate. The proposed scheme is very simple and robust, strengthening security in multimedia applications.