Security Aspects in Software Defined Radio and Cognitive Radio Networks: A Survey and A Way Ahead

A very important task in Mobile Cognitive Radio Networks (MCRN) is to ensure that the system releases a given frequency when a Primary User (PU) is present, by maintaining the principle to not interfere with its activity within a cognitive radio system. Afterwards, a cognitive protocol must be set in order to change to another frequency channel that is available or shut down the service if there are no free channels to be found. The system must sense the frequency spectrum constantly through the energy detection method which is the most commonly used. However, this analysis takes place in the time domain and signals cannot be easily identified due to changes in modulation, power and distance from mobile users. The proposed system works with Gaussian Minimum Shift Keying (GMSK) and Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) for systems from Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) to 5G systems, the signals are analyzed in the frequency domain and the Rényi-Entropy method is used as a tool to distinguish the noise and the PU signal without prior knowledge of its features. The main contribution of this research is that uses a Software Defined Radio (SDR) system to implement a MCRN in order to measure the behavior of Primary and Secondary signals in both time and frequency using GNURadio and OpenBTS as software tools to allow a phone call service between two Secondary Users (SU). This allows to extract experimental results that are compared with simulations and theory using Rényi-entropy to detect signals from SU in GMSK and OFDM systems. It is concluded that the Rényi-Entropy detector has a higher performance than the conventional energy detector in the Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) and Rayleigh channels. The system increases the detection probability (PD) to over 96% with a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) of 10dB and starting 5 dB below energy sensing levels.

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A Software Defined Radio Cross-Layer Resource Allocation Approach for Cognitive Radio Networks: From Theory to Practice

IEEE Transactions on Cognitive Communications and Networking ◽

10.1109/tccn.2019.2963869 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 6 (2) ◽

pp. 740-755 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Grigorios Kakkavas ◽

Konstantinos Tsitseklis ◽

Vasileios Karyotis ◽

Symeon Papavassiliou

Keyword(s):

Resource Allocation ◽

Cognitive Radio ◽

Cognitive Radio Networks ◽

Software Defined Radio ◽

Radio Networks ◽

Cross Layer ◽

Theory To Practice ◽

Allocation Approach

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SPECTRUM SENSING AND SECURITY CONCERNS IN SOFTWARE-DEFINED RADIO AND COGNITIVE RADIO NETWORKS

International Journal of Engineering Applied Sciences and Technology ◽

10.33564/ijeast.2020.v04i12.070 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 04 (12) ◽

pp. 409-414

Author(s):

T. L Singal

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Radio ◽

Spectrum Sensing ◽

Cognitive Radio Networks ◽

Software Defined Radio ◽

Radio Networks ◽

Security Concerns

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Primary user emulation characterization in mobile cognitive radio networks

Visión electrónica ◽

10.14483/22484728.16351 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

pp. 26-34

Author(s):

Ernesto Cadena-Muñoz ◽

Luis Fernando Pedraza-Martínez ◽

Enrique Rodríguez-Colina

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Radio ◽

Cognitive Radio Networks ◽

Software Defined Radio ◽

Power Level ◽

Primary User ◽

Radio Networks ◽

Cognitive Network ◽

Primary User Emulation ◽

Primary Network ◽

Radio Equipment

This paper presents the results of the characterization of the attack known as the "primary user emulation" in mobile cognitive radio networks performing the implementation and testing. The tools and their configuration to carry out the attack are presented and their effects on the network are analyzed. The results show how to generate the attack with a software-defined radio equipment (SDR) using GNU-Radio and OpenBTS. The effects of the possible configurations of the attack on the network are shown, the malicious type generates constant interference on the primary or cognitive network, the selfish type allows to imitate a licensed or primary user generating interference to the primary network and inability to access the Cognitive Network while active. If the emulator's power level is fixed, the services it provides are stable. If the power is variable the services suffer intermittency. Primary user emulation is the attack that most affects the cognitive radio network so its effects are analyzed in order to propose ways of detecting or applying countermeasures.

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