Impact of channel estimation errors on effectiveness of Eigenvector-based jamming for physical layer security in wireless networks

In this paper, we present our study of an Eigenvector-based artificial noise-based jamming technique developed to provide increased wireless physical layer security in transmit-receive diversity systems and analyze the impact of channel estimation errors on system performance. Our simulation results showed that with knowledge of perfect channel state information, the technique provided secrecy capacity of approximately 7 bits/s/Hz for a normalized transmit power of 25 dB for a variety of transmit, receive, and eavesdropper configurations. We also describe a novel method to simulate generalized channel state information estimation errors. While other publications neglect the impact of these estimation errors, our simulations show that the secrecy capacity decreased rapidly as the channel estimation errors increased. For instance, at 25% error the secrecy capacity of the jamming technique was only slightly better than the non-jamming case. Our paper also outlines upcoming research efforts to further explore error sensitivity and channel state temporal stability through experimentation.