Wireless sensor networks and their security challenges
Khaleel Ur Rehman, Shumila Hassan, Khadija Naveed, Rameesa Akhter
{19014119-(066,070,112,128)}@uog.edu.pk
Abstract: The significant advances of hardware
manufacturing technology and the development
of efficient software algorithms make technically
and economically feasible a network composed of
numerous, small, low-cost sensors using wireless
communications, that is, a wireless sensor
network (WSN). Security is becoming a major
concern for WSN protocol designers because of
the wide security-critical applications of WSNs.
In this article, how WSN differs from wired
network and other wireless network and also
basic information about the WSN and its security
issues compared with wired network and other
wireless networks is discoursed. Summarization
of typical attacks on sensor networks and survey
about the literatures on several important security
issues relevant to the sensor networks are also
dissertated.
Keywords: Wireless Sensor Network,
Security, Vulnerabilities, Security
Mechanism.
Introduction: Today sensors are everywhere.
We take these for granted, but sensors are in
our phones, workplaces, vehicles, and the
environment. A sensor network comprises a
group of small, powered devices, and a
wireless or wired networked infrastructure.
The sensor network connects to the internet
or computer networks to transfer data for
analysis and use. Sensor network nodes
cooperatively sense and control the
environment. [1].
Sensor networks can be wired or
wireless. Wired sensor networks use
ethernet cables to connect
sensors. Wireless sensor networks
(WSNs) use technologies such as
Bluetooth, cellular, WIFI or near field
communication (NFC) to connect
sensors.
Sensor networks typically include sensor
nodes, actuator nodes, gateways, and
clients. Sensor nodes group inside the
sensor field and form networks of
different topologies.[2]
 A sensor node monitors the
data collected by the sensor and
transmits this to other sensor nodes.
 During the transmission
process, data may be handled by
multiple nodes as it reaches a
gateway node.
 The data is then transferred to
the management node.
 The management node is
managed by the user and
determines the monitoring required
and collects the monitored data.
Wired & Wireless Networks: Wireless
sensors are becoming more common in
the world of sensor-based applications.
This is mainly because they are cheaper
to install and easy to maintain. In
addition to this it should also be noted
that wireless sensor networks allow for a
 greater level of flexibility. This makes it nodes detect the same event. In this
easier to adapt a sensor system to the case, one of them generates a final
needs of the user. Despite these benefits, report after collaborating with the other
wireless sensors still have some nodes. The BS can process the report
disadvantages. For example, they are and then forward it through either high-
often limited by distance as the speed at quality wireless or wired links to the
which the data is transferred depends on
external world for further processing.
the location of the receiving device
The WSN authority can send commands
relative to the sensor. Compared to this,
wired sensors have a much more or queries to a BS, which spreads those
predictable data transfer time. [3], [4]. commands or queries into the network.
Hence, a BS acts as a gateway between
In many situations wired sensors are among the the WSN and the external world. An
most reliable systems as they directly link the example is illustrated in Figure. 1[5]
sensor to the device that is receiving the input.
This means that wired sensors are also the most
durable systems which do not need to be replaced
often. However, it should be noted that wired
systems require a large amount of space and are
much more complicated to maintain. This burden
increases in size as more sensors are used based
on the application that the sensor is designed for.

Wireless Sensor Network: A WSN is a large

network of resource-constrained sensor nodes
with multiple preset functions, such as sensing
and processing, to fulfill different application
objectives. The major elements of WSN are the
sensor nodes and the base stations. In fact, they
can be abstracted as the “sensing cells” and the
“brain” of the network, respectively.
Sensor nodes keep monitoring the
network area after being deployed.
Hardware Components of Sensor Node:
After an event of interest occurs, one of
When choosing the hardware
the surrounding sensor nodes can detect
components for a wireless sensor node,
it, generate a report, and transmit the evidently the application’s requirements
report to a BS through multi hop play a decisive factor. A sensor node
wireless links. Collaboration can be integrates hardware and software for
carried out if multiple surrounding sensing, data processing, and
 communication. They rely on wireless• Should provide real-time support.
channels for transmitting data to and
receiving data from other nodes. Figure 2 • Should provide efficient resource
illustrates the basic structure of a sensormanagement mechanisms.
node. The lifetime of a sensor node
depends to a large extent on the battery
lifetime; hence it is extremely important
to adopt energy-efficient strategies for
information processing. A sensor node is
made up of a sensing unit, a processing
unit, a transceiver unit, and a power unit
as shown in Figure.[6],[7]
Software Components of Sensor Node:
Traditional OS are not suitable for wireless sensor
networks because WSNs have constrained
resources and diverse datacentric applications, in
addition to a variable topology. WSNs need a
new type of operating system, considering their
special characteristics.
Sensor operating systems (SOS) should
embody the following functions, bearing in
mind the limited resource of sensor nodes:
• Should be compact and small in size.
• Should support reliable and efficient
code distribution.
• Should support power management.
• Should provide a generic
programming interface up to sensor
middleware or application software.
• Should support parallel
processing along with threading
when a sensor is deployed for
multiple purposes.[8][9]
Sensor Node Types: Desirable
functionality of sensor nodes in a
WSN include: ease of installation,
self-indication, self-diagnosis,
reliability, time awareness for
coordination with other nodes, some
software functions and DSP, and
standard control protocols and
network interfaces. There are many
sensor manufacturers and it is too
costly for them to make special
transducers for every network on the
market. Different components made
by different manufacturers should be
compatible.
Security: Wireless mobile ad hoc
networks (MANETs) and sensor
networks have many applications in
military, homeland security, and other
areas. In that many sensor networks
have mission-critical tasks. Security is
critical for such networks deployed in
hostile environments, and security
concerns remain a serious impediment
to widespread adoption of these
wireless networks. The security issues
in MANETs are more challenging
than those in traditional wired
computer networks and the Internet.
Providing security in sensor networks
is even more difficult than in
MANETs due to the resource
limitations of sensor nodes. Most
sensor networks actively monitor their
surroundings, and it is often easy to
deduce information other than the
data monitored. Such unwanted
information leakage often results in
privacy breaches of the people in the
environment. The combination of
these factors demands security for
sensor networks at design time to
ensure operation safety, secrecy of
sensitive data, and privacy for people
in sensor environments. Significant
efforts and research have been
undertaken to enhance security levels
of wireless networks.
Why Security Complicated in WSN:
Security in sensor networks is
complicated by the constrained
capabilities of sensor node hardware.
• The overall cost of the WSN
should be as low as possible.
.• Advanced anti-jamming techniques
such as frequency hopping spread
spectrum and physical tamper
proofing of nodes are generally
impossible in a sensor network due to
the requirements of greater design
complexity and higher energy
consumption.
• The use of radio transmission, along
with the constraints of small size, low
cost, and limited energy, make WSNs
more susceptible to denial-of-service
attacks.
•. Attacks on a WSN can come from
all directions and target at any node
leading to leaking of secret
information, interfering message etc.
• Security also needs to scale to large-
scale deployments. Most current
standard security protocols were
designed for two-party settings and do
not scale to a large number of
participants.
• Since sensor nodes usually have
severely constrained, asymmetric
cryptography is often too expensive
for many applications. Thus, a
promising approach is to use more
efficient symmetric cryptographic
alternatives.
• Instead, most security schemes
make use of symmetric key
cryptography. One thing required in
either case is the use of keys for
secure communication. Managing key
distribution is not unique to WSNs,
but again constraints such as small
memory capacity make centralized
keying techniques impossible.
Security Requirements: In short, the
goal of security is to provide security
services to defend against all the
kinds of threat. It provides the
analysis of security and survivability
requirements concern with the design
goals of scalability, efficiency, key
connectivity and reliability.
Authentication ensures that the other
end of a connection or the originator
of a packet is the node that is claimed.
Access-control prevents unauthorized
access to a resource. Confidentiality
protects overall content or a field in a
message. Confidentiality can also be
required to prevent an adversary from
undertaking traffic analysis. Privacy
prevents from obtaining information
that may have private content. The
private information may be obtained
through the analysis of traffic
patterns, i.e., frequency, source node,
routes, etc. Ensures that a packet is
not modified during transmission is
known as Integrity. Authorization:
authorizes another node to update
information (import authorization) or
to receive information (export
authorization). Anonymity hides the
source of a packet or frame. It is a
service that can help with data
confidentiality and privacy. Non-
repudiation proves the source of a
packet. In authentication the source
proves its identity. Non-repudiation
prevents the source from denying that
it sent a packet. Freshness ensures that
a malicious node does not resend
previously captured packets.
Availability mainly targets DoS
attacks and is the ability to sustain the
networking functionalities without
any interruption due to security
threats. Resilience to attacks required
to sustain the network functionalities
when a portion of nodes is
compromised or destroyed. In
Forward secrecy a sensor should not
be able to read any future messages
after it leaves the network. In
Backward secrecy a joining sensor
should not be able to read any
previously transmitted message.
Survivability is the ability to provide
a minimum level of service in the
presence of power loss, failures or
attacks.
Holistic Security in WSN: A holistic
approach aims at improving the
performance of WSNs with respect to
security, longevity and connectivity
under changing environmental
conditions. The holistic approach of
security concerns about involving all
the layers for ensuring overall security
in a network. For such a network, a
single security solution for a single
layer might not be an efficient
solution rather security is to be
ensured for all the layers of the
protocol stack that is employing a
holistic approach could be the best
option.
Using Wireless Properties to
Increase Security: Every
cryptographic design is based on the
principles of confusion and diffusion.
Confusion refers to a relationship
between a secret key and a cipher
text; such a relationship should be
kept as complex and as possible.
Diffusion aims to reduce any
statistical relationship between the
plaintext and the cipher text as far as
possible. Interestingly, such a diffuse
relationship between input and output
may also be found in wireless
communication. It is well investigated
that even a small change in physical
position, antenna orientation or subtle
changes of the physical environment
strongly affect the signal strength
measured at a receiver, especially in
transmissions lacking Line-Of-Sight
(LOS). physical phenomena of wave
propagation such as reflection,
diffraction, scattering and fading
account for properties similar to
confusion and diffusion. In a security
context, this means that determining
the exact physical configuration that
produces a specific set of signal
properties at the receiver may equal
an exhaustive brute-force attack on a
search space defined by the available
physical positions, frequencies,
transmission power levels, etc. The
idea of security by wireless is to use
wireless properties offered by the
communication itself to design
lightweight security mechanisms.
Issues with High-Level Security
Mechanisms
Cryptography & Key Management:
To achieve security in WSNs, it is
important to be able to perform
various cryptographic operations,
including encryption, authentication,
and so on. Selecting the appropriate
cryptography method for sensor nodes
is fundamental to providing security
services in WSNs.
The process by which public key and
symmetric key cryptography schemes
should be selected is based on the
following: 1. Energy: how much
energy is required to execute the
encrypt/decryption functions 2.
Program memory: the memory
required to store the
encryption/decryption program 3.
Temporary memory: the required
RAM size or number of registers
required temporarily when the
encryption/decryption code is being
executed 4. Execution time: the time
required to execute the
encryption/decryption code. 5.
Program parameters memory: the
required memory size to save the
required number of keys used by the expensive tamper-resistant hardware.
encryption/decryption function. Besides the exposure of secret
information (e.g., cryptographic
Secure Group Management: In-
keys), compromised sensors may be
network processing of the raw data is
reprogrammed with malicious code to
performed in WSNs by dividing the
launch all kinds of insider attacks.
network into small groups and
Very desirably, if we can identify and
analyzing the data aggregated at the
further revoke those corrupted nodes
group leaders. So the group leader has
in a timely manner, the potential
to authenticate the data it is receiving
damages caused by them could be
from other nodes in the group. This
minimized. To address this problem, a
requires group key management.
promising direction is to use code
However, addition or deletion of
attestation to validate the code
nodes from the group leads to more
running on each sensor node. Because
problems.
the code running on a malicious node
Secure Location Discovery: A sensor must be different from that on a
locations play a critical role in many legitimate node, we can detect
sensor network applications, such as compromised nodes by verifying their
environment monitoring and target memory content.
tracking. Without protection, an
Conclusions: Security concerns
attacker may easily mislead the
constitute a potential stumbling block
location estimation at sensor nodes
to the impending wide deployment of
and subvert the normal operation of
sensor networks. WSNs are still under
sensor networks. For example, an
development, and many protocols
attacker may provide incorrect
designed so far for WSNs have not
location references by replaying the
taken security into consideration. On
beacon packets intercepted in
the other hand, the salient features of
different locations. Moreover, an
WSNs make it very challenging to
attacker may compromise a beacon
design strong security protocols while
node and distribute malicious location
still maintaining low overheads. In
references by lying about the location
this article, we summarize typical
or manipulating the beacon signals.
attacks on sensor networks and
Code Attestation: Sensors that surveyed the literatures on several
operate in an unattended, harsh or important security issues relevant to
hostile environment often suffer from the sensor networks, including key
break-in compromises, because their management, secure location
low costs do not allow the use of
discovery, code attestation and etc. [6] Tanveer Zia and Albert Zomaya,
Many security issues in WSNs remain “Security Issues in
open and we expect to see more
Wireless Sensor Networks”, IEEE.
research activities on these exciting
topics in the future. [7] Yong Wang, Garhan Attebury,
And Byrav Ramamurthy,
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