Kolmogorov-Smirnov based method for detecting black hole attack in vehicular ad-hoc networks

Abstract

The security of ad hoc networks continues to pose a major challenge in today's digital age. Threatened by unscrupulous users, especially in decentralized and open architectures, ad-hoc vehicular networks make protection against malicious attacks a difficult task. Vehicular networks, a specific subset of ad hoc networks, inherit security vulnerabilities from their parent network. One of the best-documented attacks is the black hole, in which a malicious user attempts to manipulate the routing mechanism to gain unauthorized access to the route, then intercepts and discards data packets. The result is an interruption of service to the intended recipient. In our research, we propose a black hole attack detection system based on the Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistical method. This system is designed to identify communication disruptions caused by such attacks without requiring structural modifications to the routing protocol. The results show that the proposed method can detect the presence of the attack by monitoring network activity. The results are tested and validated using SUMO (Simulation of Urban MObility) to generate microscopic road traffic, and NS-2 (Network Simulator) to generate network communication.