Trust and cluster based authentication schemes in mobile Ad Hoc networks — A review

Mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a distinct kind of network where the nodes are connected by way of wireless medium and without any infrastructure. Nodes in the network are fully dependent on other nodes so as to complete the mission successfully. In addition to this, nodes are moving freely and make dynamic topology. Moreover these types of networks can be easily constructed whenever and wherever required. It offers plenty of applications; it also has its own weaknesses that are disturbing the network from a security perspective. In order to do the data transmission successfully, each node should trust other while forwarding node that is ensuring authentication with which it is communicating by the way of cooperating with each other. But achieving such cooperation in this distinct environment is too difficult. Moreover scalability is one of the considerable issues, because number of nodes in the MANET can increase dramatically. Clustering is an idea to provide the scalability to the MANET. Our aim in this review is to present schemes which are mainly focused on trust and cluster based authentication for MANET and also discuss their advantages and complexity and discuss the attacks that mainly affect the authentication and we have also discussed the importance of clustering and trust in MANET along with their properties.