Extending security horizon through identification authentication and tracking services in hierarchical vehicular networks

Abstract

The inter-vehicle communication in vehicular ad hoc network must be protected from unauthorized message injection and message alteration of unauthentic vehicles. A lightweight scheme for identification, authentication and tracking of vehicles in hierarchical vehicular ad hoc network is proposed in the present work. This work aims to preserve the basic security features such as authentication, confidentiality, and integrity in presence of attackers whose operational capability is in between mote-class attacker and lap-top class attacker. In the present scheme the communication among the different levels of the hierarchical vehicular ad hoc network is in encrypted form to protect the network from the access of attackers. The performance of the scheme is evaluated qualitatively and quantitatively. Both the qualitative and quantitative performance of the proposed scheme is compared with the existing schemes.