Tutorial 1

By:  Prof. Yi Qian

University of Nebraska-Lincoln, NE,  USA 

Abstract

Mobile wireless security is one of the most important topics and attracting more and more attention from industry, research, and academia. Network system security encompasses integrity, authentication, confidentiality and non-repudiation of both user and management information. Unlike wired communication networks that have some degree of physical security, physical security in mobile wireless communication networks is impossible to achieve on wireless links (because of the broadcast nature) and therefore security attacks on information flow are the most widespread. Modification of information is possible because of the nature of the channel and the mobility of nodes.

The radio channel is harsh and subject to interference, fading, multipath, and high error rates. As a result, packet losses are common even without security threats. An opponent can make use of these natural impairments to modify information and also render the information unavailable. This tutorial will address all these issues. Special attention will be paid to wireless specific issues, e.g., tradeoffs between security and power consumption, adaptively changing security protocols in response to the radio channel, etc. This tutorial covers the topics on security for next generation mobile wireless networks, with focusing on 4G (LTE and LTE-A) and 5G mobile wireless network systems, followed by a discussion on the challenges and open research issues in the area.

About the Speaker

Yi Qian is a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL). Prior to joining UNL, he worked in the telecommunications industry, academia, and the government. His research interests include information assurance and network security, network design, network modeling, simulation and performance analysis for next generation wireless networks, wireless ad-hoc and sensor networks, vehicular networks, smart grid communication networks, broadband satellite networks, optical networks, high-speed networks and the Internet. He is serving on the editorial board for several international journals and magazines, including serving as the Associate Editor-in-Chief for IEEE Wireless Communications Magazine. He was the Chair of IEEE Communications Society Technical Committee for Communications and Information Security 2014-2015.

He is a Distinguished Lecturer for IEEE Vehicular Technology Society. Prof. Qian has been teaching “Network Security” every fall semester, and “Wireless Security” every spring semester after he joined University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2009. He received two best teaching awards from the College of Engineering at UNL in the last few years. After teaching “Wireless Security” at UNL for the last seven years, Prof. Qian is writing a comprehensive textbook on the topic, “Security in Wireless Communication Networks”, to be published by Wiley/IEEE Press in 2017.