Analysis and Compensation of Latencies in NTS-secured NTP Time Synchronization

Abstract

Many time synchronization services use the Network Time Protocol (NTP), which resides in the upper OSI layers and is thus usually implemented in software. However, software-related runtimes reduce the synchronization accuracy and are further influenced by the cryptographic protection of time messages using the Network Time Security protocol (NTS). This paper examines these runtimes and shows the effects on popular NTP implementations. After separating these latencies into their components, we present different approaches for compensation by modifying the NTP timestamps. For non-correctable latencies, this paper provides mitigation strategies to improve the synchronicity.