LiSec-RTF: Reinforcing RPL Resilience Against Routing Table Falsification Attack in 6LoWPAN

TL;DR

This paper proposes LiSec-RTF, a lightweight security mechanism using PUFs to defend against Routing Table Falsification attacks in 6LoWPAN networks, significantly enhancing network reliability and security.

Contribution

It introduces a novel security solution leveraging Physical Unclonable Functions to authenticate routing messages in resource-constrained 6LoWPAN devices.

Findings

LiSec-RTF reduces impact of RTF attacks on packet delivery.

It improves end-to-end delay and power consumption metrics.

The solution performs well in both static and mobile scenarios.

Abstract

Routing Protocol for Low-Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) is an energy-efficient routing solution for IPv6 over Low-Power Wireless Personal Area Networks (6LoWPAN), recommended for resource-constrained devices. While RPL offers significant benefits, its security vulnerabilities pose challenges, particularly due to unauthenticated control messages used to establish and maintain routing information. These messages are susceptible to manipulation, enabling malicious nodes to inject false routing data. A notable security concern is the Routing Table Falsification (RTF) attack, where attackers forge Destination Advertisement Object (DAO) messages to promote fake routes via a parent nodes routing table. Experimental results indicate that RTF attacks significantly reduce packet delivery ratio, increase end-to-end delay, and leverage power consumption. Currently, no effective countermeasures exist in the literature, reinforcing the need for a security solution to prevent network disruption and protect user applications. This paper introduces a Lightweight Security Solution against Routing Table Falsification Attack (LiSec-RTF), leveraging Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) to generate unique authentication codes, termed Licenses. LiSec-RTF mitigates RTF attack impact while considering the resource limitations of 6LoWPAN devices in both static and mobile scenarios. Our testbed experiments indicate that LiSec-RTF significantly improves network performance compared to standard RPL under RTF attacks, thereby ensuring reliable and efficient operation.