Performance of RPL-based Wireless Sensor Networks Subjected to Selected Attacks

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The paper focuses on evaluating the performance of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) equipped with the Routing Protocol for Low-Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) that have been subjected to Blackhole, Sinkhole, Version Number and DIS Flooding attacks. In a WSN consisting of dozens of sensors, which are also nodes forwarding IPv6 traffic to a border node, the IPv6/6LoWPAN/IEEE 802.15.4 protocol stack was used. The indicated attacks were carried out in two scenarios. In the first, selected sensors were replaced with sensors with modified software, which enabled an attack on the RPL protocol. In the next scenario, intruder nodes were added to the network, which attached themselves to the existing network structure and thus carried out attacks on the RPL protocol. The article is oriented not to evaluate the effectiveness of the attacks in both scenarios, but to evaluate the performance of the sensor network during the success of each attack. Thus, it was possible to draw conclusions about such an organization of sensor network structures that will enable minimizing the effects of selected attacks in the context of maximizing network performance. Due to the fact that all of the aforementioned attacks were carried out simultaneously at different locations on the network, the degradation of the network resulted in a significant decrease in its performance. Nevertheless, thanks to the research performed, a number of recommendations were prepared to prepare a network that performs its tasks despite the success of individual attacks.