A Survey on Intelligent MAC Layer Jamming Attacks and Countermeasures in WSNs

Security abides a tremendous key requirement in the context of Internet of Things (IoT). IoT connects multiple objects together through wired and wireless connections in the aim of enabling ubiquitous interaction where any components can communicate with each other without any constraint. One of the most important elements in the IoT concept is Wireless Sensor Network (WSN). Due to their unattended and shared nature of radio for communication, security becomes an important issue. Wireless sensor nodes are vulnerable to radio jamming. When the jammer has the ability to interpret data link layer protocols, it becomes as energy-efficient as legitimate nodes. This paper presents a comprehensive survey on different sophisticated jamming attacks based on MAC layer. Techniques used to defeat each one of the intelligent jammers are classified based on the knowledge capacity of MAC protocols rules. The concepts behind existing protocols, that are dedicated by design to defeat such type of jammers, are presented. We conclude by a recapitulative table summarizing jamming attacks and proposed MAC-based solutions, and highlight open research directions.