Distributed secure routing protocol for Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks

Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks (MANETs) reputation is ever increasing rapidly. With the wide spread of MANET the need for securing routing protocols emerges as a very important issue, which is not easy to achieve in MANET. The concept and structure of MANETs make them prone to be easily attacked using several techniques often used against wired networks as well as new methods that have been particularly developed for MANETs. In this paper, we have focused, in particular, on the security issues related to Ad-Hoc routing protocols. A new protocol, based on Authenticated Routing for Ad-Hoc Networks (ARAN) Protocol and Zone Routing Protocol (ZRP) is proposed. The proposed Authenticated Routing for Ad-Hoc Networks with zoning (ARANz) introduces a distributive nature routing algorithm, which improves performance of routing protocol by dividing the area into zones. ARANz also saves network bandwidth and nodes memory by using reactive routing protocol instead of proactive one (ARAN). Furthermore, it increases network security by introducing local and global Certificate Authority servers.The performance of ARANz is compared to the two existing well known routing protocols: AODV and ARAN protocols. This comparison was done using GloMoSim simulator. The results show the superiority of our protocol in various aspects.