Blockchain-Based Secure Routing Protocol for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks over Dynamic Wireless Channels

Abstract

MANETs are ad-hoc networks in which there are no fixed nodes or a structure and they are highly mobile, have changing topologies, and open communication environment through wireless media thus prompting them to be susceptible to a wide range of security attacks which include but are not limited to black hole, Sybil and route tampering. Conventional routing such as AODV and DSR do not provide the mechanisms required to provide robust trust, integrity and security within such volatile networks. The paper suggests a new Blockchain-Based Secure Routing Protocol (BSRP) which is specifically designed to support MANETs to operate on dynamic wireless channels. BSRP combines the simplicity of a lightweight blockchain architecture in the routing stack that supports tamper-proof route information logging, decentralized trust and robust authentication of nodes. The consensus mechanism Proof-of-Authentication (PoA) guarantees that the potential overhead is kept to the minimum and the nodes can verify transactions and information on the routing services without involving the centralized sources. Smart contracts are implemented to automate the most important security activities including neighbor trust checks, rout verification and detection of malicious patterns based on history. Routes are discovered, acked and node reputations are kept within a local blockchain ledger at each node and routing is made transparency and secure. There are extensive simulations over the NS-3 protocol in a realistic wireless channel configuration in terms of Rayleigh fading and mobility models. Important performance indicators like packet delivery ratio, end-to-end delay, control overhead and attack resistance are discussed and their values compared with traditional routing protocols. Findings show that BSRP outsmarts baseline protocols in the area of data delivery assuredness and countering attacks by significant margins (up to 35 percent and well resistant to blackhole and Sybil attacks). The results verify that the use of blockchain integration is scalable and secure because it could be used to support routing in MANETs, especially on mission-critical and adversarial networks. This paper defines BSRP as effective and feasible security enhanced routing framework, which provides the basis of decentralized trust-type approaches in future mobile wireless networks.