An Information-Theoretic Approach to Distributed Detection for Mobile Wireless Sensor Networks Under Byzantine Attack in Entirely Unknown or Complicated Environment: Design, Analysis, and Evaluation of the Attack Strategy

Abstract

The parallel distributed detection is studied for mobile wireless sensor networks (MWSNs) in the presence of Byzantine attacks in entirely unknown environment or complicated environment from the perspective of the information theory, where we pay most of our attention toward design, analysis, and evaluation of the attack strategy. In particular, the multihop relay network and the harsh wireless communication condition, e.g., the dynamic and entirely unknown channel, are taken into consideration in our configuration. Second, the conditions that the optimal attacking strategy should satisfy is analyzed and developed under different attacking scenarios. Third, the minimum attacking power is developed for the Byzantines to blind the fusion center (FC). Furthermore, the optimal attacking strategies are developed when no prior information of the system is known for the Byzantines. Finally, the traditional four typical attack strategies are evaluated, and we find that the fraction of Byzantines is the only factor that affects the reliable data fusion when the network size and the attacking strategy are fixed. The extensive simulation is conducted to verify our design, analysis, and evaluation of the attack strategy.