Security Challenges and Potential Solutions in Aerial-Terrestrial Wireless Networking

Integration of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with terrestrial networks form an aerial-terrestrial wireless networking concept. Particularly, the UAVs are composed of Internet of Things sensors (IoTs) and they also are typically known as flying IoTs. These are used to collect real-time data for diverse network's applications in order to make optimal network performance and secure management decisions. In this networking domain, cyber-attacks on UAVs sensors are rapidly increasing and the attacks on sensors inevitably raise the data sparsity issue, means the recorded data, by drones or UAVs, could be often incomplete and even sparse enough too. This impacts the performance eval-uation of this networking composed of flying and ground base stations. This paper explores the data sparsity issue in context of the integration of aerial-terrestrial wireless networks. Critical challenges and potential high-level solutions are also proposed to enhance the security and performance of networks.