Security Threats and Challenges on Different Protocol Layers in Cognitive Radio Networks: An Overview

In the past decade, there has been a rapid development of new technologies in wireless communication which has led an increased demand for radio spectrum. The radio spectrum needs to be utilized effectively because of the fixed assignment policy of the spectrum a large part of the licensed spectrum remains under-utilized. This is leading to the concept of the strategic use of these bands by so called, Cognitive Radio (CR) and CR Networks (CRN). CR is a revolutionary technology which allows the unlicensed user to co-exist along with licensed user. It complements the wireless device by helping in improving its efficiency, reliability, and speed. New security threats have being lifted along with the understanding of cognitive radio, which thereby degrades the performance of cognitive radio. Because of the wireless nature of CRNs, they face all kinds of threat possible in traditional wireless networks. The main objective of this work is to sum up all possible security threats and challenges on different protocol layers in CRN.