Automatic node configuration protocol using modified CGA in hierarchical MANETs

Abstract

The CGA is designed to prevent address spoofing and stealing and to provide digital signature to users without any help from security infrastructures, but fake key generation and address collision appear in flat-tiered network. To solve these problems, CGA defines security parameter (SEC), which is set to high value when high security is required. Although CGA with high SEC makes attackers be difficult to find fake key, it brings an alarming increase in processing time to generate CGA. On the contrary, the probability to find a fake key is high if low SEC is applied to CGA. In this paper, MCGA applicable to as well public networks as ad-hoc networks is proposed. Address collision problems are settled by employing hierarchy. Using MCGA, no previous setup is required before communication, and automatic node configuration is feasible. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.