Performance analysis of using a reliable transport layer protocol for transmitting EAP message over RADIUS in inter-domain WLAN roaming

The field of wireless network security gained a lot of attention in recent years. Many protocols and procedures were developed to meet those needs. Authentication, authorization and accounting protocol are already tremendous importance to realize a secure wireless networks infrastructure. In this paper, we analyze the performance of using UDP and TCP as the underlying transport layer protocol for RADIUS when transmitting EAP message in inter-domain environment. The inter-domain authentication requires message exchange between the RADIUS server of the visited domain and the home RADIUS server of the roaming user. Because these inter-domain exchanges occur over the wide area networks or internet, they are subject to packet loss and high delays. The results presented here show that the overall authentication delay is reduced significantly by using a reliable transport protocol, TCP.