Secure neighbor position discovery in vehicular networks

Abstract

In vehicular ad hoc networks, knowledge of neighbor positions is a requirement in a number of important tasks. However, distributed techniques to perform secure neighbor position discovery, suitable for highly mobile ad hoc environments, are missing. In this paper, we address this need by proposing a lightweight distributed protocol that relies only on information exchange among neighbors, without any need of a-priori trustworthy nodes. We present a detailed security analysis of our protocol in presence of one or multiple adversaries, and we evaluate its performance in a realistic vehicular environment.