Blockchain Authentication for AODV Routing Protocol

Recently, wireless ad-hoc networks have become a significant component in the digital revolution and smart cities. The heterogeneity and high-mobility in smart city systems have arisen the need for the mobile ad-hoc network (MANET). Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) emerges as an efficient routing protocol in MANET is based on the less overhead by reducing message exchange with limited information. However, this creates a weakness as nodes have limited knowledge about other nodes' identity inside the path beyond the neighboring node (node in transmission range). That prevents the participant from authenticating others and has limited capability to check the integrity of the exchanged information. To accomplish this, it requires a further exchange of messages that defeat the AODV main principle and causes extra overhead that drains the portable devices' limited battery energy inside the network. This paper used the blockchain concept to generate a hashed identifier from the node's IP and passed between nodes inside the path during the route discovery that provides assurance about the identity of the node and keeps the integrity of the exchanged information. Additionally, Simulation results using (Riverbed/Opnet) of the attack scenario show that the proposed algorithm prevents impersonation and black-hole attacks by eliminating the path that involves malicious nodes with a (4 millisecond) increase in route discovery time.