An adaptive learning routing protocol for the prevention of distributed denial of service attacks in wireless mesh networks

Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) have potentially unlimited applications in the future. Therefore, establishing a viable and secure wireless network routing protocol for these networks is essential. Currently, these networks are being used in connecting large sections of cities by setting up wireless routers at strategic points all around the city. These networks can also support connecting remote areas of the country, instead of having to lay a cable all the way. The nature of applications mentioned above make these networks prone to different attacks. Thus, security of these networks is a serious concern. In this paper, we study the impact of Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks on WMNs. We base our work on the existing Optimized Link State Routing protocol (OLSR) and we weave in concepts of Learning Automata (LA) to protect the network from this kind of attack. The simulation results for the proposed scheme show that the proposed protocol is effective in the prevention of DDoS attacks in WMNs. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.