Enhanced Rank Attack Detection Algorithm (E-RAD) for securing RPL-based IoT networks by early detection and isolation of rank attackers

Abstract
Internet of Things (IoT) is becoming a crucial requirement for linking numerous
physical devices or gadgets to the web. Due to large volume of data exchanged,
security in IoT still remains a key challenge. Additionally, maintaining security in
routing protocols like Routing Protocol for Low-power and Lossy networks (RPL)
is becoming more difficult because IoT devices are heterogeneous and resourceconstrained.
RPL builds a tree topology using control packets. Since more control
packets are exchanged, modification in the content of control packets gives rise to a
number of attacks including rank attacks, version attacks, flood attacks and so forth.
Rank attack is a major attack that causes loop creation, energy depletion, decreased
packet delivery, increased packet delivery latency and other problems. Since rank
attacks have a significant adverse effect on the network, an effort has been made to
enhance the default mechanism of RPL and so that the rank attackers can be quickly
identified and isolated. The proposed E-RAD (Enhanced-Rank Attack Detection)
algorithm deploys rate limiting technique to control the generation of DIO (DODAG
Information Object) packet and also uses DIS (DODAG Information Solicitation)
message solicitation to isolate the rank attackers. If an attacker is missed using
above mechanism, it can be detected from the consistency check of hash value in
DAO (Destination Advertisement Object) message. An alarm is set off against the
rank attackers as soon as it is found. An alarm is an attachment to the control message
itself and is not a standalone packet. E-RAD algorithm resulted in 1356 J of
energy usage, 775 ms of packet delivery delay, 95.53% of delivery ratio, 97.23% of
accuracy and 1023 packets of overhead in control packet generation.
Keywords IoT · RPL · Rank attack · Control packets · Hash · Alarm