Preserving QoI in participatory sensing by tackling location-spoofing through mobile WiFi hotspots

The Quality of Information (QoI) in Participatory Sensing (PS) systems largely depends on the location accuracy of participating users. However, users could easily provide false information through Location Spoofing Attacks (LSA). Existing PS systems are not able to efficiently validate the position of users in large-scale outdoor environments, thus being prone to reduced QoI. In this paper we present an efficient scheme to secure PS systems from LSAs. In particular, the user location is verified with the help of mobile WiFi hot spots (MHSs), which are users activating WiFi interface on their smart phones and waiting connections from nearby users, and thereby validating their position inside the sensing area. A reputation-based algorithm is proposed to rule out sensing reports of location-spoofing users, thereby increasing the reliability of the PS system. The effectiveness of our scheme is analyzed by real-world experiments and simulation study.