One of the most important design problems for multi-UAV (Unmanned Air Vehicle) systems is the communication which is crucial for cooperation and collaboration between the UAVs. If all UAVs are directly connected to an infrastructure, such as a ground base or a satellite, the communication between UAVs can be realized through the in-frastructure. However, this infrastructure based communication architecture restricts the capabilities of the multi-UAV systems. Ad-hoc networking between UAVs can solve the problems arising from a fully infrastructure based UAV networks. In this paper, Flying Ad-Hoc Networks (FANETs) are surveyed which is an ad hoc network connecting the UAVs. The differences between FANETs, MANETs (Mobile Ad-hoc Networks) and VANETs (Vehicle Ad-Hoc Networks) are clarified first, and then the main FANET design challenges are introduced. Along with the existing FANET protocols, open research issues are also discussed.

Flying Ad-Hoc Networks (FANETs)

Due to the broadcast nature of radio propagation, the wireless air interface is open and accessible to both authorized and illegitimate users. This completely differs from a wired network, where communicating devices are physically connected through cables and a node without direct association is unable to access the network for illicit activities. The open communications environment makes wireless transmissions more vulnerable than wired communications to malicious attacks, including both the passive eavesdropping for data interception and the active jamming for disrupting legitimate transmissions. Therefore, this paper is motivated to examine the security vulnerabilities and threats imposed by the inherent open nature of wireless communications and to devise efficient defense mechanisms for improving the wireless network security. We first summarize the security requirements of wireless networks, including their authenticity, confidentiality, integrity, and availability issues. Next, a comprehensive overview of security attacks encountered in wireless networks is presented in view of the network protocol architecture, where the potential security threats are discussed at each protocol layer. We also provide a survey of the existing security protocols and algorithms that are adopted in the existing wireless network standards, such as the Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, WiMAX, and the long-term evolution (LTE) systems. Then, we discuss the state of the art in physical-layer security, which is an emerging technique of securing the open communications environment against eavesdropping attacks at the physical layer. Several physical-layer security techniques are reviewed and compared, including information-theoretic security, artificial-noise-aided security, security-oriented beamforming, diversity-assisted security, and physical-layer key generation approaches. Since a jammer emitting radio signals can readily interfere with the legitimate wireless users, we also introduce the family of various jamming attacks and their countermeasures, including the constant jammer, intermittent jammer, reactive jammer, adaptive jammer, and intelligent jammer. Additionally, we discuss the integration of physical-layer security into existing authentication and cryptography mechanisms for further securing wireless networks. Finally, some technical challenges which remain unresolved at the time of writing are summarized and the future trends in wireless security are discussed.

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A Survey on Wireless Security: Technical Challenges, Recent Advances, and Future Trends

Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism

The shared nature of the medium in wireless networks makes it easy for an adversary to launch a Wireless Denial of Service (WDoS) attack. Recent studies, demonstrate that such attacks can be very easily accomplished using off-the-shelf equipment. To give a simple example, a malicious node can continually transmit a radio signal in order to block any legitimate access to the medium and/or interfere with reception. This act is called jamming and the malicious nodes are referred to as jammers. Jamming techniques vary from simple ones based on the continual transmission of interference signals, to more sophisticated attacks that aim at exploiting vulnerabilities of the particular protocol used. In this survey, we present a detailed up-to-date discussion on the jamming attacks recorded in the literature. We also describe various techniques proposed for detecting the presence of jammers. Finally, we survey numerous mechanisms which attempt to protect the network from jamming attacks. We conclude with a summary and by suggesting future directions.

Denial of Service Attacks in Wireless Networks: The Case of Jammers

This paper examines the security vulnerabilities and threats imposed by the inherent open nature of wireless communications and to devise efficient defense mechanisms for improving the wireless network security. We first summarize the security requirements of wireless networks, including their authenticity, confidentiality, integrity and availability issues. Next, a comprehensive overview of security attacks encountered in wireless networks is presented in view of the network protocol architecture, where the potential security threats are discussed at each protocol layer. We also provide a survey of the existing security protocols and algorithms that are adopted in the existing wireless network standards, such as the Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, WiMAX, and the long-term evolution (LTE) systems. Then, we discuss the state-of-the-art in physical-layer security, which is an emerging technique of securing the open communications environment against eavesdropping attacks at the physical layer. We also introduce the family of various jamming attacks and their counter-measures, including the constant jammer, intermittent jammer, reactive jammer, adaptive jammer and intelligent jammer. Additionally, we discuss the integration of physical-layer security into existing authentication and cryptography mechanisms for further securing wireless networks. Finally, some technical challenges which remain unresolved at the time of writing are summarized and the future trends in wireless security are discussed.

/pdf/a-survey-on-wireless-security-technical-challenges-recent-k705wofne7.pdf

A Survey on Wireless Security: Technical Challenges, Recent Advances and Future Trends

Jamming represents the most serious security threat in the field of wireless sensor networks (WSNs), as it can easily put out of order even WSNs that utilize strong highlayer security mechanisms, simply because it is often ignored in the initial WSN design. The objective of this article is to provide a general overview of the critical issue of jamming in WSNs and cover all the relevant work, providing the interested researcher pointers for open research issues in this field. We provide a brief overview of the communication protocols typically used in WSN deployments and highlight the characteristics of contemporary WSNs, that make them susceptible to jamming attacks, along with the various types of jamming which can be exercised against WSNs. Common jamming techniques and an overview of various types of jammers are reviewed and typical countermeasures against jamming are also analyzed. The key ideas of existing security mechanisms against jamming attacks in WSNs are presented and open research issues, with respect to the defense against jamming attacks are highlighted.

A survey on jamming attacks and countermeasures in WSNs

Review: Mobile recommender systems in tourism

The tourist trip design problem (TTDP) refers to a route-planning problem for tourists interested in visiting multiple points of interest (POIs). TTDP solvers derive daily tourist tours, i.e., ordered visits to POIs, which respect tourist constraints and POIs attributes. The main objective of the problem discussed is to select POIs that match tourist preferences, thereby maximizing tourist satisfaction, while taking into account a multitude of parameters and constraints (e.g., distances among POIs, visiting time required for each POI, POIs visiting days/hours, entrance fees, weather conditions) and respecting the time available for sightseeing on a daily basis. The aim of this work is to survey models, algorithmic approaches and methodologies concerning tourist trip design problems. Recent approaches are examined, focusing on problem models that best capture a multitude of realistic POIs attributes and user constraints; further, several interesting TTDP variants are investigated. Open issues and promising prospects in tourist trip planning research are also discussed.

A survey on algorithmic approaches for solving tourist trip design problems

A large class of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) applications involve a set of isolated urban areas (e.g., urban parks or building blocks) covered by sensor nodes (SNs) monitoring environmental parameters. Mobile sinks (MSs) mounted upon urban vehicles with fixed trajectories (e.g., buses) provide the ideal infrastructure to effectively retrieve sensory data from such isolated WSN fields. Existing approaches involve either single-hop transfer of data from SNs that lie within the MS's range or heavy involvement of network periphery nodes in data retrieval, processing, buffering, and delivering tasks. These nodes run the risk of rapid energy exhaustion resulting in loss of network connectivity and decreased network lifetime. Our proposed protocol aims at minimizing the overall network overhead and energy expenditure associated with the multihop data retrieval process while also ensuring balanced energy consumption among SNs and prolonged network lifetime. This is achieved through building cluster structures consisted of member nodes that route their measured data to their assigned cluster head (CH). CHs perform data filtering upon raw data exploiting potential spatial-temporal data redundancy and forward the filtered information to appropriate end nodes with sufficient residual energy, located in proximity to the MS's trajectory. Simulation results confirm the effectiveness of our approach against as well as its performance gain over alternative methods.

Charalampos Konstantopoulos

Papers

A survey on jamming attacks and countermeasures in WSNs

Review: Mobile recommender systems in tourism

A survey on algorithmic approaches for solving tourist trip design problems

A Rendezvous-Based Approach Enabling Energy-Efficient Sensory Data Collection with Mobile Sinks

Clustering in Wireless Sensor Networks