Detecting Sybil attacks in vehicular networks

Abstract Abstract A Sybil attack consists of an adversary assuming multiple identities to defeat the trust of an existing reputation system. When Sybil attacks are launched in vehicular networks, the mobility of vehicles increases the difficulty of identifying the malicious vehicle location. In this paper, a novel protocol for Sybil detection in vehicular networks is presented. Considering that vehicular networks are cyber-physical systems, the technique exploits well grounded results in the physical (i.e., transportation) domain to detect the Sybil attacks in the cyber domain. Compared to existing works that rely on additional cyber hardware support, or complex cryptographic primitives for Sybil detection, the protocol leverages the theory of platoon dispersion that models the physics of naturally occurring vehicle dispersion. Specifically, the proposed technique employs a certain number of roadside units that periodically collect reports from vehicles regarding their physical neighborhood. Leveraging from existing models of platoon dispersion, a protocol was designed to detect anomalously close neighborhoods that are reflective of Sybil attacks. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is unique in integrating a well established theory in transportation engineering for detecting cyber space attacks in vehicular networks. The resulting protocol is simple, efficient, and robust in diverse attack environments.