A Survey of Distributed Certificate Authorities in MANETs

TL;DR

This survey reviews various distributed certificate authority protocols in MANETs, categorizing them and evaluating their performance and security to identify the most effective solutions for decentralized authentication.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive categorization and comparison of DCA protocols in MANETs, highlighting the best options based on security and performance metrics.

Findings

Categorized DCA protocols into distinct groups

Compared protocols based on security and efficiency

Identified top-performing DCA solutions for MANETs

Abstract

A Certificate Authority (CA) provides the critical authentication and security services for Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) which are used for the Internet and wired networks. In MANETs (wireless and ad hoc) there is an inability to offer a centralized CA to provide these security services. Recent research has looked to facilitate the use of CAs within MANETs through the use of a Distributed Certificate Authority (DCA) for wireless and ad hoc networks. This paper presents a number of different types of DCA protocols and categorizes them into groups based on their factors and specifications. The paper concludes by proposing the best DCA security services in terms of performance and level of security.