At the March EuroSec workshop in Rotterdam, Anthony Moulds presented the results of work on enhancing the resilience of Internet of Things (IoT) devices to radio jamming attacks - something with wider ramifications for a variety of smart devices, including intelligent lighting, security cameras and virtual assistants, including those using the latest Thread protocol standards.
This work by Dr Poonam Yadav, Anthony Moulds and Peter Gillingham demonstrates, with practical implementation, the use of channel-hop based countermeasures to improve the resilience of IoT connectivity when under jamming attacks.
Abstract
As the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem continues to expand, ensuring robust wireless communication in the face of radio jamming attacks has become a critical concern. This paper presents a comprehensive case study on improving IoT resilience to radio jamming using the Thread protocol within a controlled testbed environment. We investigate the vulnerability of Thread-based IoT networks to constant jamming and implement an effective countermeasure to improve network robustness. Our study focuses on the channel hopping method for countermeasure implementation, demonstrating its effectiveness against jamming attacks through detailed experimental results and analysis. This work underscores how jamming and countermeasure systems can be developed and tested on real hardware, fostering further research in the field of network security. The experimental results provide valuable insights into the efficacy of these strategies in mitigating jamming threats.