In this paper, we propose a new transmission scheme, referred as Bit Interleaved Coded Modulation with Indexed Partitions (BICM-IPM), to secure the transmission on a wiretap channel with a passive eavesdropper. The BICM-IPM is designed to degrade the quality of QAM symbols transmission on a wiretap channel, while preserving the quality at the legitimate receiver. To achieve this, the QAM constellation is divided into several disjoint subsets, each one indexed by a channel-dependent dynamic secret key, known at the sender (Alice) and the legitimate receiver (Bob), but not at the eavesdropper (Eve). The symbols are then decoded at the legitimate receiver considering only the alphabet containing the symbols relative to the partition. However, in the absence of the index-partition knowledge at the eavesdropper, all the constellation symbols will be considered. Thus, the detection zones around Bob’s symbols will be larger than those at Eve. To further degrade the wiretap channel, we propose to inject a uniformly distributed random noise in a domain space totally included in Bob’s detection zone, but exceeding Eve’s one. Our analytical and numerical results show that the BICM-IPM creates a Bit Error Rate (BER) floor of 50% independent of the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) on the Eavesdropper’s link, while preserving the legitimate link for which the BER decreases with the SNR. This creates a maximal entropy at the eavesdropper side that is close to decoding a random binary sequence.
In this paper, we propose a new transmission scheme, referred as Bit Interleaved Coded Modulation with Indexed Partitions (BICM-IPM), to secure the transmission on a wiretap channel with a passive eavesdropper. The BICM-IPM is designed to degrade the quality of QAM symbols transmission on a wiretap channel, while preserving the quality at the legitimate receiver. To achieve this, the QAM constellation is divided into several disjoint subsets, each one indexed by a channel-dependent dynamic secret key, known at the sender (Alice) and the legitimate receiver (Bob), but not at the eavesdropper (Eve). The symbols are then decoded at the legitimate receiver considering only the alphabet containing the symbols relative to the partition. However, in the absence of the index-partition knowledge at the eavesdropper, all the constellation symbols will be considered. Thus, the detection zones around Bob’s symbols will be larger than those at Eve. To further degrade the wiretap channel, we propose to inject a uniformly distributed random noise in a domain space totally included in Bob’s detection zone, but exceeding Eve’s one. Our analytical and numerical results show that the BICM-IPM creates a Bit Error Rate (BER) floor of 50% independent of the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) on the Eavesdropper’s link, while preserving the legitimate link for which the BER decreases with the SNR. This creates a maximal entropy at the eavesdropper side that is close to decoding a random binary sequence.
In this paper, we propose a noisy and dynamic-index partitioned modulation (IPM) to secure a quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) constellation transmission over a non-degraded wiretap channel. Unlike approaches that rely on multi-antenna systems or tight amplitude-phase tracking, IPM partitions QAM into multiple disjoint subsets that are separately indexed by a dynamic key, known at the transmitter (Alice) and the legitimate receiver (Bob), but not at the eavesdropper (Eve). The proposed IPM maps the information bits into multiple sequences, each one lying in a different partition of the QAM constellation space. This mapping is performed through a cross-bit labeling that we define to increase the confusion at the eavesdropper, while minimizing the bit error rate (BER) at the legitimate receiver. As the eavesdropper is not aware of the dynamic index pointing to the different partitions, the IPM creates larger Voronoï detection zones around Bob’s symbol compared to Eve. To induce further confusion at Eve, we inject random uniform noise into IPM symbols. The noise varies in a domain that is fully included in Bob’s larger detection zone, but it exceeds Eve’s detection zone. The performances of the noisy IPM scheme in terms of error rate and secrecy rate are analytically and numerically evaluated. Our results show that the IPM scheme creates on the Eavesdropper’s link an error floor, independently of its signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). However, the IPM scheme preserves the legitimate link, for which the BER decreases as the SNR increases. Indeed, the secrecy rate remains positive for all SNR values and achieves an asymptotical constant plateau value.
In physical-layer security, communication secrecy is commonly achieved by providing the legitimate receiver a physical-layer advantage over the eavesdropper or, equivalently, by making the eavesdropper's channel more degraded than the legitimate receiver's, a setting traditionally known as the degraded wiretap channel. There may be situations, however, where such advantages cannot be guaranteed. One example is the wireless channel where the legitimate receiver's channel may be more degraded than the eavesdropper's owing to a deep fade (outage), additive interference at the edge of a network cell, etc. To our knowledge, such scenarios have not been remedied in the related literature. Thus, we propose in this work the first physical-layer security scheme that achieves communication in a setting where the eavesdropper has the physical-layer advantage over the legitimate receiver, a scenario that we call the reversely-degraded wiretap channel. Precisely, we show that by constraining the transmitter's input to be discrete uniformly distributed (such as an on-off keying modulation) and by using nonlinear threshold-based signal detection, the legitimate receiver is guaranteed to have a positive secrecy capacity even though the eavesdropper has a better signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). The former requirement on the input distribution is to limit the capacity gains of the eavesdropper at high SNR. The latter requirement allows the communication channel to exhibit supra-threshold stochastic resonance, a phenomenon whereby noise improves signal detection and increases the mutual information. A numerical example is provided to confirm our claims.
We propose a systematic concatenated coding scheme based on the combination of interleaving with powerful channel codes and jamming for wireless secrecy under the practical assumption of codes in the finite blocklength regime. The basic idea lies in generating a short random key that is used to shuffle/interleave information at the source, Alice. This key is then sent to the legitimate receiver, Bob, during a brief period of advantageous communication over the eavesdropper Eve (e.g., due to more interference from a jammer). Finally, the key is decoded at Bob to properly deinterleave the original information. Bob receives a better quality version of the interleaving key, therefore having the needed advantage over Eve. Information reliability is provided by a strong inner code, while security against Eve results from the proper selection of the outer code and interference levels over the key. We propose a methodology for selection of the outer code with reliability and security constraints. For that, we introduce bit error complementary cumulative distribution function metrics, suitable for security and reliability analysis of error correcting codes.
This paper investigates the problem of source-channel coding for secure transmission with arbitrarily correlated side informations at both receivers. This scenario consists of an encoder (referred to as Alice) that wishes to compress a source and send it through a noisy channel to a legitimate receiver (referred to as Bob). In this context, Alice must simultaneously satisfy the desired requirements on the distortion level at Bob and the equivocation rate at the eavesdropper (referred to as Eve). This setting can be seen as a generalization of the problems of secure source coding with (uncoded) side information at the decoders and the wiretap channel. A general outer bound on the rate-distortion-equivocation region, as well as an inner bound based on a pure digital scheme, is derived for arbitrary channels and side informations. In some special cases of interest, it is proved that this digital scheme is optimal and that separation holds. However, it is also shown through a simple counterexample with a binary source that a pure analog scheme can outperform the digital one while being optimal. According to these observations and assuming matched bandwidth, a novel hybrid digital/analog scheme that aims to gather the advantages of both digital and analog ones is then presented. In the quadratic Gaussian setup when side information is only present at the eavesdropper, this strategy is proved to be optimal. Furthermore, it outperforms both digital and analog schemes and cannot be achieved via time-sharing. Through an appropriate coding, the presence of any statistical difference among the side informations, the channel noises, and the distortion at Bob can be fully exploited in terms of secrecy.
Secure communication over a wireless channel in the presence of a passive eavesdropper is considered. Our main interest is in the disadvantaged wireless environment, where the channel from the transmitter Alice to the eavesdropper Eve is (possibly much) better than that from Alice to Bob, hence making information-theoretic secrecy challenging. We present a method to exploit inherent vulnerabilities of the eavesdropper's receiver through the use of “cheap” cryptographically-secure key-bits, which only need be kept secret from Eve for the (short) transmission period of the message, to obtain information-theoretic (i.e. everlasting) secret bits at Bob. In particular, based on an ephemeral cryptographic key pre-shared between Alice and Bob, a random jamming signal with large variations is added to each symbol. The legitimate receiver Bob uses the key to subtract the jamming signal immediately, while Eve is forced to perform the inherently nonlinear operation of recording the signal; when Eve then obtains the key, which we assume pessimistically (for Alice) happens right after message transmission, Eve can then immediately subtract the jamming signal from the recorded signal. But, because of the intervening non-linear operation in Eve's receiver and the non-commutativity of nonlinear operations, Bob's channel and Eve's channel have different achievable rates and information-theoretic secrecy can be obtained, hence achieving the goal of converting the vulnerable cryptographic secret key into information-theoretic secure bits. The achievable secrecy rates for different settings are evaluated. Among other results, it is shown that, even when the eavesdropper has perfect access to the output of the transmitter (albeit through an imperfect analog-to-digital converter), the method can still achieve a positive secrecy rate.
Providing security guarantee is a critical concern in the ad-hoc networks relying on multi-hop channels, since their flexible topology is vulnerable to security attacks. To enhance the security of a spatial modulation (SM) assisted wireless network, various SM mapping patterns are activated by random channel quality indicator (CQI) patterns over the legitimate link, as a physical-layer secret key. The SM signals are encrypted by random mapping patterns to prevent eavesdroppers from correctly demapping their detections. This secret key is developed for multi-hop wiretap ad-hoc networks, where eavesdroppers might monitor all the transmitting nodes of a legitimate link. We substantially characterise the multi-hop wiretap model with receiver diversity techniques adopted by eavesdroppers. The security performance of the conceived scheme is evaluated in the scenarios where eavesdroppers attempt to detect their received signals using maximal-ratio combining or maximum-gain selection. The achievable data rates of both legitimate and wiretapper links are formulated with the objective of quantifying the secrecy rates for both Gaussian-distributed and finite-alphabet inputs. Illustrative numerical results are provided for the metrics of ergodic secrecy rate and secrecy outage probability, which substantiate the compelling benefits of the physical-layer secret key generation via CQI-mapped SM.