A detailed survey on selfish node detection techniques for mobile ad hoc networks

Due to the limited transmission capability of mobile nodes in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs), the intermediate nodes are used in multi-hop fashion for forwarding the packets for other nodes. However, the multi-hop communication causes a serious problem that a node may act as selfish by refraining from forwarding the packets for other nodes in order to save its energy and computing resources. A selfish node attempts to utilize the network resources for its own benefits, but reluctant to spend its resources for others. Therefore, it is really important to scrutinize and isolate the selfish nodes from the network in order to trim down the risks from such nodes, and improve the security of the network. This paper presents a comparative study of most prominent selfish node detection and mitigation techniques proposed by the researchers in the literature.