Physical layer security using BCH and LDPC codes with adaptive granular HARQ

Transmission techniques based on channel coding with feedback are proposed in this paper to enhance the security of wireless communications systems at the physical layer. Reliable and secure transmission over an additive noise Gaussian wiretap channel is investigated using Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem (BCH) and Low-Density Parity-Check (LDPC) channel codes. A hybrid automatic repeat-request (HARQ) protocol is used to allow for the retransmission of coded packets requested by the intended receiver (Bob). It is assumed that an eavesdropper (Eve) has access to all forward and feedback transmitted packets. To limit the information leakage to Eve, retransmitted packets are subdivided into smaller granular subpackets. Retransmissions are stopped as soon as the decoding process at the legitimate (Bob) receiver converges. For the hard decision decoded BCH codes, a framework to compute the frame error probability with granular HARQ is proposed. For LDPC codes, the HARQ retransmission requests are based on received symbols likelihood computations: the legitimate recipient request for the retransmission of the set of bits that are more likely to help for successful LDPC decoding. The performances of the proposed techniques are assessed for nul and negative security gap (SG) values, that is when the eavesdropper's channel benefits from equal or better channel conditions than the legitimate channel.