Attack Detection in Wireless Localization

Accurately positioning nodes in wireless and sensor networks is important because the location of sensors is a critical input to many higher-level networking tasks. However, the localization infrastructure can be subjected to non-cryptographic attacks, such as signal attenuation and amplification, that cannot be addressed by traditional security services. We propose several attack detection schemes for wireless localization systems. We first formulate a theoretical foundation for the attack detection problem using statistical significance testing. Next, we define test metrics for two broad localization approaches: multilateration and signal strength. We then derived both mathematical models and analytic solutions for attack detection for any system that utilizes those approaches. We also studied additional test statistics that are specific to a diverse set of algorithms. Our trace-driven experimental results provide strong evidence of the effectiveness of our attack detection schemes with high detection rates and low false positive rates across both an 802.11 (WiFi) network as well as an 802.15.4 (ZigBee) network in two real office buildings. Surprisingly, we found that of the several methods we describe, all provide qualitatively similar detection rates which indicate that the different localization systems all contain similar attack detection capability.