Factors Impacting Key Management Effectiveness in Secured Wireless Networks

The security of ad hoc wireless networks has become a focal point of the military communications research community. A Mobile Ad Hoc Network (MANET) is an autonomous collection of mobile nodes that communicate over relatively bandwidth constrained, wireless links. Since MANETs require no existing communication infrastructure, they offer significant advantages in their scalability and flexibility. These attributes make MANETs extremely attractive for specialized application environments such as those encountered on the battlefield, in emergency situations, and in disaster areas. Unfortunately, MANETs also exhibit significant weaknesses in security when compared to other wireless communication solutions. They are subject to localized attacks and suffer from vulnerabilities inherent to their structure and topology. The use of a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) offers a cryptographic solution that can overcome many, but not all, of the MANET security problems. One of the most critical aspects of a PKI system is how well it implements Key Management. Key Management deals with key generation, key storage, key distribution, key updating, key revocation, and certificate service in accordance with security policies over the lifecycle of the cryptography. While traditional PKI solutions work well in fixed wired networks, they may not be appropriate for MANETs due to the lack of a fixed infrastructure to support the PKI. In this research, we investigate key management within PKI implementations in wireless networks to identify critical factors and best practices to secure these networks. Recommendations will be made for deploying secure MANETs based upon the research findings.