Secure Communication for Amplify-and-Forward Relay Networks With Finite Alphabet Input

This paper considers secure communication for amplify-and-forward (AF) relay networks with finite alphabet input. The joint optimization of power selection and beamforming design for improving the physical layer security of AF relay networks with single and multiple eavesdroppers is investigated. For the case with one eavesdropper, we transform the problem of multi-variable beamforming design into a single-variable optimization problem through semi-definite programming and solve it with one-dimensional optimization techniques. Moreover, the corresponding source power is obtained by utilizing the relation between the mutual information and minimum mean square error. Then, an iterative two-step algorithm is proposed to maximize the achievable secrecy rate. In the presence of multiple eavesdroppers, a zero-forcing beamforming scheme, where the confidential signal is nulled out in the direction of all eavesdroppers, is proposed to enhance the physical layer security. We decouple the source power and the beamforming vector by transforming the achievable secrecy rate into a single-variable function of the source power. Then, the suboptimal source power and the corresponding beamforming vector with low-complexity are derived. Numerical examples show that the proposed schemes significantly enhance the secrecy performance of the AF relay networks.