ABSTRACT

Cognitive Radio Networks are envisioned to drive the next generation wireless
networks that can dynamically optimize spectrum use. Recent advancement in wireless
technology is creating a spectrum shortage problem on a daily basis. Cognitive radio,
a novel technology, attempts to solve these problems by dynamically using the free
spectrum in wireless communication. It is a wireless technology which is aware of its
environment and uses a certain methodology by changing its operational parameters
to complete two important objectives: highly reliable communication and efficient
utilization of the radio spectrum. Cognitive radio networks (CRNs), can be formed
using cognitive radios by extending the radio link features to network layer functions.

These CRNs are entitled to achieve the result by means of sensing, understanding,
making decisions and adapting to the environment. CRNs are more flexible and
exposed to Wireless Networks compared with other traditional radio networks.
However, there are many security threats to CRNs because of its special
characteristics, such as intelligence functionality and dynamic spectrum access
application. Securing communication, while exploiting the flexibilities offered by
Cognitive Radio still remains a daunting challenge. Some of the challenges and threats
to CRNs can be found in Spectrum sensing, Spectrum decision, Spectrum sharing and
Spectrum mobility.

This project aims to study Cooperative Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio and
prove how it is better than the non-cooperative scenario. Also, we aim to tackle the
challenges and threats by making a security model to make CRN’s more secure from
the malicious attacks.. Spectrum sharing has been proposed as an effective method
to improve spectrum utilization efficiency. Spectrum sensing is a key aspect for
successful spectrum sharing. Collaborative spectrum sensing offers various
advantages over individual spectrum sensing which include the decrease in
sensitivity requirements for individual sensing devices, improved detection
performance even in highly faded environment and the like. But the presence of
malicious users severely degrades the system performance.

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Spectrum sensing for one CR user has many challenges to overcome, such as multipath
fading or shadowing. Thus, in that occasion we can utilize coop- erative spectrum
sensing. This type of sensing is realized in a CR network and the presence or absence
of the primary user’s signal is decided by many users or a base station. In this thesis,
we are giving important background information about CRs and how we were lead to
that technology. Moreover, we are going to describe the problem of spectrum sensing,
what are the spectrum holes and the challenges that a CR must face in order to sense
the RF spectrum efficiently. A big part of this thesis is the profound study of the most
important techniques for sensing the spectrum and the comparison among them.
Finally, we are discussing Cooperative Spectrum Sensing; the way it can be
implemented and the problems that it can solve.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Certificate i
Acknowledgement ii
Abstract 1
List of Figures 5

Chapter No. Topic Page No.

Chapter 1 Introduction 6-8

1.1 Motivation 6
1.2 Objective 7
1.3 Layout of Report 8

Chapter 2 Literature Review 9-11

2.1 Overview 9
2.2 Misbehaving User Detection 10
2.3 Summary 11
Chapter 3 About Cognitive Radio 12-22
3.1 History of Cognitive Radio 12
3.2 CRN Architecture 13
3.2.1 Vision of CR 14
3.2.2 SDR v/s CR 16
3.3 CR Advantages and Applications 17
3.3.1 Vision of CR 17
3.3.2 SDR v/s CR 18
3.4 Requirements of Cognitive Radio 20
3.5 Cognitive Radio Functions 22
3.6 Acceptance of Cognitive Radio 22

Chapter 4 Spectrum Holes and standard 23-25

4.1 Concept of Spectrum Holes 23

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 4.1.1 Temporal Spectrum Holes 23
4.1.2 Spatial Spectrum Holes 24
4.2 IEEE 802.22 Standard 25

Chapter 5 Spectrum Sensing 27-32

5.1 Spectrum Sensing 27
5.2 Types of Spectrum Sensing 27
5.2.1 Spectrum Sensing Methodologies 28
5.2.2 Cooperative Spectrum Sensing 29
5.3 Advantages of Cooperative Spectrum Sensing 30
5.4 System Requirements 31
5.5 Challenges of Spectrum Sensing 32

Chapter 6 Results and Discussion 34-39

6.1 Energy Detection v/s Matched Filter Detection 34
6.2 Non-Cooperative v/s Cooperative Sensing 35
6.3 Developed Algorithm for Security 39

Chapter 7 Conclusion and Future Scope 40-41

7.1 Conclusion and Future Scope 41

REFERENCES 42

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 LIST OF FIGURES

Fig 1.1-Cognitve Radio Environment

Fig 2.1- Flowchart for verifying whether a transmitter is malicious or a legitimate user
Fig 3.1- Cognitive Radio Architecture
Fig 3.2- Spectrum Occupancy region of bands in 30Mhz- 3Ghz (Chicago, NYC)
Fig 3.3- Spectrum Occupancy region of bands in 30Mhz- 3Ghz (Dublin, Ireland)
Fig 3.4- Example of public safety and emergency responder teams
Fig 3.5- All applications of CRNs
Fig 3.6- Cognitive Radio Duty cycle
Fig 4.1- Types of Spectrum Holes
Fig 4.2- IEEE 802.22 WRAN service topology
Fig 5.1- Cooperative Spectrum Sensing in CRNs
Fig 5.2- The hidden license user problem in CR System
Fig 6.1- Comparison of Energy and Matched Filter Detector for SNR= -6db
Fig 6.2- Agility gain in two user networks under constrained scheme
Fig 6.3- Agility gain in two user networks with varying alpha
Fig 6.4- Detection of time comparison with and without cooperation
Fig 6.5- Proposed Security Flowchart

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CHAPTER 1
Introduction
There are likely to be a variety of different views of what exactly what a cognitive
radio may be. Accordingly, a definition of a cognitive radio may be of use in a number
of instances.

A cognitive radio may be defined as a radio that is aware of its environment, and the
internal state and with a knowledge of these elements and any stored pre-defined
objectives can make and implement decisions about its behavior. In general, the
cognitive radio may be expected to look at parameters such as channel occupancy, free
channels, the type of data to be transmitted and the modulation types that may be used.
It must also look at the regulatory requirements. In some instances, a knowledge of
geography and this may alter what it may be allowed to do.

In some instances, it may be necessary to use a software defined radio, so that it can
reconfigure itself to meet the achieve the optimal transmission technology for a given
set of parameters. Accordingly, Cognitive radio technology and software defined radio
are often tightly linked.

Fig1.1: Cognitive Radio Environment

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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has made the licensed spectrum
available to unlicensed users. This will allow unlicensed users to use the empty
spectrum, provided they cause no interference to licensed users. This will lead to the
development of spectrum sensing techniques.

There are two different types of spectrum sharing scenarios [1]. They are:

￮ Cooperative scenario

￮ Non-cooperative scenario

1.1 Motivation

The need for higher data rates is increasing as a result of the transition from voice-only
communications to multimedia type applications. Given the limitations of the natural
frequency spectrum, it becomes obvious that the current static frequency allocation
schemes cannot accommodate the requirements of an increasing number of higher data
rate devices. As a result, innovative techniques that can offer new ways of exploiting
the available spectrum are needed. For this purpose, the Federal Communications
Commission (FCC) has approved the use of licensed bands by unlicensed users, and
thus a novel network named CRNs with cognition ability emerges.

1.2 Objectives

In this project first, we have compared the two spectrum detection techniques i.e.
Energy Detection and Matched Filter Detection. We aim to study the cooperative
spectrum sensing in Cognitive Radio and prove how it is better than non-cooperative
scenario. The aim of having chosen this project is to provide security in cognitive radio
networks. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has made the licensed
spectrum available to unlicensed users. This will allow unlicensed users to use the
empty spectrum, provided they cause no interference to licensed users. This will lead
to the development of spectrum sensing techniques. Thus, we aim to provide an
efficient way for spectrum sensing using energy detection method. But this can lead to
unauthorized and unlawful usage of spectrum creating various challenges and threats.
This creates a demand for a secure way to carry on the functioning of the system. Here,

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we propose a security model for ensuring secure communication between any two
entities in the network.

1.3 Layout of the Report

A brief chapter by chapter overview is presented here:

Chapter 2: In this chapter literature review of different techniques and advancements

in cognitive radio is discussed along with the attacks and challenges in implementing
the CRN.

Chapter 3: In this chapter we mention the advantages and applications of CR.

Chapter 4: In this chapter, concept of spectrum holes is discussed.

Chapter 5: In this chapter concept of cooperative sensing is discussed.

Chapter 6: Comparison of energy detector and matched detector along with

comparison of cooperative v/s non cooperative sensing and security model.

Chapter 7: Conclusion and Future Scope.

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CHAPTER 2
Literature Review

We have done an extensive research on the topic and referred many papers to
understand the concept. Different papers give different solutions and adopt different
approaches. Some papers provide solutions with number of assumptions, limiting it
from reaching the practical-ity. While some papers only proposed theoretical solutions
without any experimental base. Keeping the Objective in mind, all the required
solutions and sources have been described in the coming sections.

2.1 OVERVIEW
CRN was first described by Mitola in his Ph.D Thesis, Cognitive radio: Integrated
agent architecture for software defined radio in 2000. Radioscene analysis,
Channelstate estimation, predictive modeling, Transmit power control, dynamic
spectrum management, described extensively by[15] Simon Haykin, tells us the basic
idea of cognitive spectrum sensing. Also it discusses the basic requirements of
performing efficient methods for spectrum sensing and the challenges associated with
it. They provided the hypothesis probability of detection and probability of false alarm,
but failed to mention the concept of security model while sensing.
Cognitive Radios (CR) has the capability to adapt to the communication
parameters. As Akyildiz et. al explains about the reconfigurability and the cognitive
capability. The radio should sense the environment constantly, based on the result; it
needs to change the parameters giving birth to a cognitive cycle. Fig. 2.1 shows a basic
cognitive cycle. Based on the environmental parameters, namely battery life,
occupancy information, noise power, etc., the CR can change the transmission
parameters like carrier frequency, power, modulation method and index, bandwidth,
symbol rate, etc., for a proficient usage of the spectrum
According to Akyildiz et.al, the four basic functions of the cognitive radios for
enabling DSA are as follows:
 Sensing of Spectrum: Cognitive radio need to sense unused spectrum for
secondary usage without interfering primary user.
 Management of Spectrum: Cognitive radio need to nd the best available

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 spectrum for optimizing the communication requirements.
 Mobility of Spectrum: Cognitive radio need to seamlessly transition the
spectrum used for communication, when needed to leave the currently used
spectrum
 Sharing of Spectrum: Cognitive radio need to fairly share the available
spectrum among the coexisting secondary users. By enabling secondary
utilization of the spectrum, cognitive radios can help in efficient usage of the
spectrum.

2.2 Misbehaving User detection

In cooperative scenario, the primary user shares the spectrum occupancy information
with the legitimate secondary user to improve the reliability and better spectrum
utilization. In this scenario, a misbehaving user (node) can masquerade to be a primary
user and send fallacious spectrum occupancy information to the secondary users, thus
disproving the dynamic spectrum theory. It is very important to detect the misbehaving
user and disregard the information and requests sent by them. Our research on
identifying a misbehaving user led to pleasant surprises. Chen et.al proposes a
transmitter verification technique using the signal characteristics and more importantly
the location of the primary user. The below Fig. 2.2 shows a flowchart for verifying
whether a transmitter is a malicious or misbehaving user, or a secondary user or a
legitimate primary user (Chen, 2008). [6]

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 Fig2.1: Flowchart for verifying whether a transmitter is malicious or a legitimate user

This technique makes use of the location information to verify the transmitter. As the
location information may also be known to a malicious user, he may masquerade the
location information and pretend to be a primary user, thereby negating the goal of the
dynamic spectrum access.

2.3 SUMMARY
From our extensive literature survey, we conclude that the cognitive radio is absolutely
a promising solution to achieve dynamic spectrum access and alleviate the
incompetent spectrum utilization. In dynamic spectrum access networks, mutual
sharing of the spectrum occupancy information helps accomplish the goal to use the
spectrum proficiently and minimize the interference to the primary users. However, it
is also important to detect and conclude the information is from the trustworthy user
and the information is not compromised, so that the spectrum sharing objective is
accomplished.

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CHAPTER 3
3.1 History of Cognitive Radio

There have been many factors that have led to the development of cognitive radio
technology. One of the major drivers has been the steady increase in the requirement
for the radio spectrum along with a drive for improved communications and speeds.
In turn this has led to initiatives to make more effective use of the spectrum, often with
an associated cost dependent upon the amount of spectrum used. In addition to this
there have been many instances where greater communications flexibility has been
required. Along the way, there have been several significant milestones along the road
to develop cognitive radio technology.

One example that exemplified the need for flexible communications occurred in the
Netherlands in 2000 when a fireworks factory exploded killing 23 people, destroying
much of the town and injuring more than a thousand people. While dealing with this
catastrophe, the emergency services (fire, medical, police, etc) experienced real
communications difficulties because they all had different communications systems
and were unable to communicate with the other services.

Another major emergency was the 9-11 terrorist attacks in the USA. Again
communications difficulties were experienced.

While often a variety of radios would be needed for intercommunications, this would
not be viable for small groups of people, and reconfigurable radios would have enabled
far more effective communications to be achieved. With spectrum becoming a scarcer
resource many radio regulatory bodies started to look at how it might be more
effectively used. In the UK a report by Professor Cave was published in 2002 detailing
the possibility of selling spectrum dependent upon the bandwidth required. This
cognitive radio technology would lend itself to this approach of spectrum management
as it would be able to utilize areas that were temporarily free and thereby maximize
the use of particular areas.

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Similarly, others had been working on the possibility of self-configuring radios. In fact
the term "Cognitive Radio" was coined by Joseph Mitola while he was writing his
doctoral thesis on the topic in 2002.

3.2 CRN Architecture

In addition to the level of processing required for cognitive radio, the RF sections will
need to be particularly flexible. Not only may they need to swap frequency bands,
possibly moving between portions of the radio communications spectrum that are
widely different in frequency, but they may also need to change between transmission
modes that could occupy different bandwidths.

To achieve the required level of performance will need a very flexible front end.
Traditional front-end technology cannot handle these requirements because they are
generally band limited, both for the form of modulation used and the frequency band
in which they operate. Even so called wide band receivers have limitations and
generally operate by switching front ends as required. Accordingly, the required level
of performance can only be achieved by converting to and from the signal as close to
the antenna as possible. In this way no analogue signal processing will be needed, all
the processing being handled by the digital signal processing.

The conversion to and from the digital format is handled by digital to analogue
converters (DACs) and analogue to digital converters (ADCs). To achieve the
performance required for a cognitive radio, not only must the DACs and ADCs have
an enormous dynamic range and be able to operate over a very wide range, extending
up to many GHz, but in the case of the transmitter they must be able to handle
significant levels of power.

Currently these requirements are beyond the limits of the technology available. Thus
the full vision for cognitive radio cannot yet be met.

Nevertheless, in the future the required DAC and ADC technology will undoubtedly
become available, thereby making cognitive radio a reality.

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 Fig3.1: Cognitive Radio Architecture

3.2.1 The vision of Cognitive Radios

The need for higher data rates is increasing as a result of the transition from voice-only
communications to multimedia type applications. The requirements for this heavy load
of data are large and it is obvious that the current static frequency allocation schemes
cannot accommodate them. As a result, we must find new techniques for exploiting
the available spectrum more efficiently.

Cognitive radio is the new key enabling technology that enables next generation
communication networks to utilize the spectrum more efficiently in an opportunistic
way without interfering with the PUs. In a report by the Shared Spectrum Company
(SSC) in 2007 it was shown that the spectrum was not used effectively in almost all
currently deployed frequency bands in USA (the same results were derived from
measurements in other countries as well). Figures 2.1 and 2.2 show the spectrum
occupancy for the region of bands in the 30 MHz to 3 GHz with the measurements
taken in New York City and Chicago (USA) and in Dublin, Ireland (EU) for the period
16-18 April 2007; these results are from the report of SSC. The spectrum occupancy
in Dublin, Ireland is similar to the ones in Chicago and New York. This proves that

14
the inefficient usage of frequency spectrum is a problem not only in USA, but also in
European countries. Thus, CRs is a solution to spectrum scarcity.

Fig3.1: Spectrum Occupancy of region of bands in 30 Mhz to 3 Ghz

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 Fig3.2: Spectrum Occupancy of region of bands in 30 Mhz to 3 Ghz

3.2.2 Software Defined Radio v/s Cognitive Radio

A SDR is a radio in which the properties of carrier frequency, signal bandwidth,
modulation and network access are defined by software. It is a general-purpose device
in which the same radio tuner and processors are used to implement many wave- forms
at many frequencies. The advantage of this approach is that the equipment is more
versatile and cost-effective. Additionally, it can be upgraded with new SW for new
waveforms and new applications after sale, delivery and installation.

A Cognitive Radio is smarter than SDR, as CR can sense changes in environment and
performs functions that best serves its users and allow them to operate in licensed
bands without a license. But CR users must detect the presence of Primary users in a
very short time and must vacate the bands for primary users.

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3.3 Cognitive Radio advantages and applications

3.3.1 Advantages

The use of a cognitive radio network provides a number of advantages when compared
to cognitive radios operating purely autonomously:

 Improved spectrum sensing: By using cognitive radio networks, it is possible

to gain significant advantages in terms of spectrum sensing.

 Improved coverage: By setting up cognitive radio network, it is possible to

relay data from one node to the next. In this way power levels can be reduced
and performance maintained.

 Avoid intentional radio jamming scenarios: By sensing channel availability

and even predicting the jammer’s tactics, cognitive radios can evade jamming
by dynamically and preemptively switching to higher quality channels.

 Improve Satellite Communication: By predicting rain fade and reconfiguring

transmitters/receivers for optimum bandwidth, cognitive radios improve
communication quality when and where the information is needed most.

 Improves Quality of Service(QOS): By sensing environmental and inadvertent

man-made radio interferences, cognitive radios can select frequency channels
with a higher Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR).

3.3.2 Applications

Because CRs are able to sense, detect and monitor the surrounding RF environment to
reconfigure their own operating characteristics to best match outside situations,
cognitive communications can increase spectrum efficiency and support higher
bandwidth service. Thus, there are many applications in which a CR can be employed.
The most popular and useful are discussed:

 For military communications: The capacity of military communications is

limited by radio spectrum scarcity because static frequency assignments freeze
bandwidth into unproductive applications, where a large amount of spectrum
is idle. CR using dynamic spectrum access can relieve the spectrum congestion

17
 through efficient allocation of bandwidth and flexible spectrum access.
Therefore, CR can provide military with adaptive, seamless and secure
communication.
 Public safety: A CR can be implemented to enhance public safety and
homeland security. A natural disaster or terrorist attack can destroy existing
communication infrastructure, so an emergency network becomes
indispensable to aid the search and rescue. As a CR can recognize spectrum
availability and reconfigure itself for much more efficient communication, this
provides public safety staff with dynamic spectrum selectivity and reliable
broadband communication to minimize information delay. Moreover, CR
supports interoperability between various communication systems. By
adaptation to the different network, CR can sustain multiple service types.

In Figure 3.2, an example of public safety teams is shown. Members of Team

A employ a communications standard operating on a carrier frequency that is
different from the communication equipment employed by both Teams B and
C. Thus, unless these teams are coordinated with respect to operating
parameters and communication standards, effective communications between
them would be nearly impossible.

Fig3.3: Example of public safety and emergency responder teams

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 Commercial purposes: Finally, another very promising application of CR is in
the commercial markets for wireless technologies. Since CR can intelligently
determine which communication channels are in use and automatically
switches to an unoccupied channel, it provides additional bandwidth and
versatility for rapidly growing data applications. Moreover, the adaptive and
dynamic channel switching can help avoid spectrum conflict and expensive
redeployment. As CR can utilize a wide range of frequencies, some of which
has excellent propagation characteristics, CR devices are less susceptible to
fading related to growing foliage, buildings, terrain and weather. When
frequency changes are needed due to conflict or interference, the CR frequency
management software will change the operating frequency automatically even
without human intervention. Additionally, the radio software can change the
service bandwidth remotely to accommodate new applications. As long as no
end-user hardware needs to be updated, product upgrades or configuration
changes can be completed simply by downloading newly released radio
management software. Thus, CR is viewed as the key enabling technology for
future mobile wireless services anywhere, anytime and with any device.

Fig 3.4: All application of CRNs

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3.4 Requirement of Cognitive Radio

Cognitive Radio is a Radio technique that aims to utilize Radio Spectrum more
efficiently by Intelligently exploiting licensed spectrum. We need to exploit the
spectrum as there is increasing number of smartphones & laptops every year which
have different QoS requirements :

 Web browsing
 Faster Internet
 Multimedia downloads

With Cognitive Radio being used in a number of applications, the area of spectrum
sensing has become increasingly important. As Cognitive Radio technology is being
used to provide a method of using the spectrum more efficiently, spectrum sensing is
key to this application. The ability of Cognitive Radio systems to access spare sections
of the radio spectrum, and to keep monitoring the spectrum to ensure that the Cognitive
Radio system does not cause any undue interference relies totally on the spectrum
sensing elements of the system.

For the overall system to operate effectively and to provide the required improvement
in spectrum efficiency, the Cognitive Radio spectrum sensing system must be able to
effectively detect any other transmissions, identify what they are and inform the central
processing unit within the Cognitive Radio so that the required action can be taken.

3.5 Cognitive Radio Functions

A typical duty cycle of CR, as illustrated in Figure 1.6, includes detecting spectrum
white space, selecting the best frequency bands, coordinating spectrum access with
other users and vacating the frequency when a primary user appears. Such a cognitive
cycle is supported by the following functions:

• spectrum sensing and analysis,

• spectrum management and handoff,

• spectrum allocation and sharing.

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 Fig 3.5: Cognitive Radio Duty Cycle

Through spectrum sensing and analysis, CR can detect the spectrum white space, i.e.
a portion of frequency band that is not being used by the primary users and utilize the
spectrum. On the other hand, when primary users start using the licensed spectrum
again, CR can detect their activity through sensing, so that no harmful interference is
generated due to SUs’ transmission. After recognizing the spectrum white space by
sensing, spectrum management and handoff function of CR enables SUs to choose the
best frequency band and hop among multiple bands according to the time varying
channel characteristics to meet various QoS requirements. For instance, when a PU
reclaims his/her frequency band, the SU that is using the licensed band can direct
his/her transmission to other available frequencies, according to the channel capacity
determined by the noise and interference levels, path loss, channel error rate, holding
time, and etc. In dynamic spectrum access, a SU may share the spectrum resources
with PUs, other SUs, or both. Hence, a good spectrum allocation and sharing
mechanism is critical to achieve high spectrum efficiency. Since PUs own the
spectrum rights, when SUs co-exist in a licensed band with PUs, the interference level
due to secondary spectrum usage should be limited by a certain threshold. When
multiple SUs share a frequency band, their access should be coordinated to alleviate
collisions and interference.

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3.6 Acceptance of Cognitive Radio

With wire-less and radio communications becoming far more widely used, and the
current levels of growth looking to increase, ideas such as cognitive radio will become
more important. Some areas of the spectrum are very heavily used while others are
relatively free.

Additionally, the ability to change modes, frequencies and power levels will not only
make communication possible for the cognitive radio system itself, but should also
reduce the overall levels of interference to other users. This is because the most
spectrum or interference efficient modes can be chosen by the cognitive radio system.

In view of the possibility of CR radio communications systems utilising the spectrum

more efficiently some regulatory bodies such as the FCC in the USA and Ofcom in the
UK are looking favourably at the idea of cognitive radio. When the idea becomes a
reality it would enable greater efficient use of the radio spectrum, which is not an
infinite resource as it once was considered. Accordingly, the way may be opened from
this viewpoint to assist the development of cognitive radio communications
technology.

While a considerable degree of research has been undertaken and a number of limited
trials of cognitive radio technology have taken place, one of the first examples of a
widely manufactured and distributed cognitive radio system is to be found in the
cellular telecommunications arena. Here the idea of femtocell base stations has been
developed to allow users to have achieve far better 3G coverage within their homes.
Using the ADSL backhaul to link into the network, the new femtocells are effectively
a form of cellular access point.

To operate correctly these femtocells must not cause interference to the main network,
nor to any adjacent femtocells. To achieve this, cognitive radio technology has been
used. By using cognitive radio, the femtocells are able to monitor their environment,
select which geographic area they are in to ensure they comply with regulatory
standards, and then choose a suitable channel frequency.

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CHAPTER 4

4.1 Concept of Spectrum Holes

Spectrum Hole is defined as a licensed spectrum band that can be used by Cognitive
Radio users without interfering the primary users.

In general, spectrum holes can be divided into two categories: temporal and spatial
spectrum holes. A further analysis is following and Figure 4.1 shows temporal (a) and
spatial (b) spectrum holes.

4.1.1 Temporal Spectrum Holes

A temporal spectrum hole means that there is no transmission over the spectrum band
of interest during the time of sensing. Thus, this band can be utilized by CR in the
current time slot. The PUs and the SUs are located in the same area, in the sense that
there can be interference between them. The CR avoids that by exploiting the spectrum
holes in time, in order not to interfere the licensed user. Consequently, it is relatively
easy to detect the presence or absence of the primary user activity since CRs only need
to have a similar detection sensitivity as regular primary receiver and the only thing
that is mandatory to do is to identify the presence of the primary signal, rather than
demodulating and decoding it. So, there is no need for high complexity in signal
processing.

4.1.2 Spatial Spectrum Holes

A spatial spectrum hole exists when the spectrum band of interest is occupied by the
primary transmission only in a restricted geographical area. Thus, this band can be
utilized by CRs only when they appear outside of this area. The difference between
temporal and spatial holes is that for the CRs to be able to use the latter they must be
outside of the transmission coverage area of the PUs. Since there are no PUs outside
the coverage area, secondary communication over the licensed band is allowed if and

23
only if the CR does not interfere with the operation of the PU inside the coverage area.
In this case, the detection of the PU’s signal from the SU is a difficult task, because
the SU falls out of the coverage area of the PU’s transmission. Therefore, it is
comprehensible that the CR needs high complexity in signal processing, because is it
obligatory that the PU’s transmission will be detected at any location where there
would be interference.

Figure 4.1: Types of Spectrum Holes

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4.2 IEEE 802.22 standard
IEEE 802.22 standard is known as cognitive radio standard because of the cognitive
features it contains. The standard is still in the development stage. One of the most
distinctive features of the IEEE 802.22 standard is its spectrum sensing requirement.
IEEE 802.22 based wireless regional area network (WRAN) devices sense TV
channels and identify transmission opportunities. The functional requirements of the
standard require at least 90% probability of detection and at most 10% probability of
false alarm for TV signals with - 116 dBm power level (approximately 0.001 pW )
or above. The sensing is envisioned to be based on two stages: fast and fine sensing.
In the fast sensing stage, a coarse sensing algorithm is employed, e.g. energy detector.
The fine sensing stage is initiated based on the fast sensing results. Fine sensing
involves a more detailed sensing where more powerful methods are used. Several
techniques that have been proposed and included in the draft standard include energy
detection, waveform-based sensing (PN511 or PN63 sequence detection and/or
segment sync detection), cyclostationary feature detection, and matched filtering. A
base station (BS) can distribute the sensing load among subscriber stations (SSs). The
results are returned to the BS which uses these results for managing the transmissions.
Hence, it is a practical example of centralized collaborative sensing. Another
approach for managing the spectrum in IEEE 802.22 devices is based on a centralized
method for available spectrum discovery. The BSs would be equipped with a global
positioning system (GPS) receiver which would allow its position to be reported. The
location information would then be used to obtain the information about available
TV channels through a central server. For low-power devices operating in the TV
bands, e.g. wireless microphone and wireless camera, external sensing is proposed as
an alternative technique. These devices periodically transmit beacons with a higher
power level. These beacons are monitored by IEEE 802.22 devices to detect the
presence of such low-power devices which are otherwise difficult to detect due to the
low-power transmission.

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Figure 4.2: IEEE 802.22 WRAN service topology

26
CHAPTER 5
5.1 Spectrum Sensing

Cognitive Radio Spectrum Sensing basics

In many areas cognitive radio systems coexist with other radio systems, using the same
spectrum but without causing undue interference. When sensing the spectrum
occupancy, the cognitive radio system must accommodate a variety of considerations:

 Continuous spectrum sensing: It is necessary for the cognitive radio system

to continuously sense the spectrum occupancy. Typically, a cognitive radio
system will utilize the spectrum on a non-interference basis to the primary user.
Accordingly, it is necessary for the Cognitive radio system to continuously
sense the spectrum in case the primary user returns.

 Monitor for alternative empty spectrum: In case the primary user returns to
the spectrum being used, the cognitive radio system must have alternative
spectrum available to which it can switch should the need arise.

 Monitor type of transmission: It is necessary for the cognitive radio to sense

the type of transmission being received. The cognitive radio system should be
able to determine the type of transmission used by the primary user so that
spurious transmissions and interference are ignored as well as transmissions
made by the cognitive radio system itself.

5.2 Types of Spectrum Sensing

There are a number of ways in which cognitive radios are able to perform spectrum
sensing. The ways in which cognitive radio spectrum sensing can be performed falls
into one of two categories:

 Non-cooperative spectrum sensing: This form of spectrum sensing, occurs

when a cognitive radio acts on its own. The cognitive radio will configure itself
according to the signals it can detect and the information with which it is pre-
loaded.

27
  Cooperative spectrum sensing: Within a cooperative cognitive radio
spectrum sensing system, sensing will be undertaken by a number of different
radios within a cognitive radio network. Typically, a central station will receive
reports of signals from a variety of radios in the network.
It will adjust the requirement according to its convenience. Cognitive radio
cooperation reduces problems of interference where a single cognitive radio
cannot hear a primary user because of issues such as shading from the primary
user, but a second primary user acting as a receiver may be able to hear both
the primary user and the signal from the cognitive radio system.

5.2.1 Spectrum Sensing Methodologies

There are a number of attributes that must be incorporated into any cognitive radio
spectrum sensing scheme. These ensure that the spectrum sensing is undertaken to
meet the requirements for the particular applications. The methodology and attributes
assigned to the spectrum sensing ensure that the cognitive radio system is able to avoid
interference to other users while maintaining its own performance.

Spectrum sensing bandwidth: There are a number of issues associated with the
spectrum sensing bandwidth. The first is effectively the number of channels on which
the system will sense whether they are occupied. By sensing channels apart from the
one currently in use, the system will be able to build up a picture of alternative channels
that can be used should the current one become occupied. Secondly the actual
reception bandwidth needs to be determined. A narrow bandwidth will reduce the
system noise floor and thereby improve the sensitivity, but it must also have a
sufficiently wide bandwidth to detect the likely transmissions on the channel.

Transmission type sensing: The system must be capable of identifying the

transmission of the primary user for the channel. It must also identify transmissions of
other units in the same system as itself. It should also be able to identify other types of
transmission that may be spurious signals, etc.

28
Spectrum sensing accuracy: The cognitive radio spectrum sensing mechanism must
be able to detect any other signal levels accurately so that the number of false alarms
is minimised.

Spectrum sensing timing windows: It is necessary that the cognitive radio spectrum
sensing methodology allows time slots when it does not transmit to enable the system
to detect other signals. These must be accommodated within the frame format for the
overall system.

5.2.2 Cooperative Spectrum Sensing

Cognitive radio cooperative spectrum sensing occurs when a group or network of

cognitive radios share the sense information they gain. This provides a better picture
of the spectrum usage over the area where the cognitive radios are located.

There are broadly two approaches to cooperative spectrum sensing:

 Centralised approach: In this approach to cognitive radio cooperative

spectrum sensing, there is a master node within the network that collects the
sensing information from all the sense nodes or radios within the network.

It then analyses the information and determines the frequencies that can be or
cannot be used. The cognitive radio central node or controller can also organise
the various sensor nodes to undertake different measurements at different
times. In this way it is possible to undertake a number of different sense actions
at the same time. For example, some nodes may be instructed to detect on
channel signal levels, while others may be instructed to measure levels on
adjacent channels to determine suitable alternatives in case a channel change
is required.

 Distributed approach: Using the distributed approach for cognitive radio

cooperative spectrum sensing, no one node takes control. Instead
communication exists between the different nodes and they are able to share
sense information. However this approach requires for the individual radios to

29
 have a much higher level of autonomy, and possibly setting themselves up as
an ad-hoc network.

Figure 5.1: Cooperative spectrum sensing in CR networks. CR1

is shadowed over the reporting channel and CR3 is shadowed
over the sensing channel. [Letaief and Zhang: “Cooperative
Communications for Cognitive Radio Networks”]

5.3 Advantages of cooperative spectrum sensing

While cognitive radio cooperative spectrum sensing is obviously more complicated

than a single non-cooperative system, it has many advantages that outweigh the added
complexity. Naturally cooperative spectrum sensing is not applicable in all
applications, but where it is applicable, considerable improvements in system
performance can be gained.

 Hidden node problem is significantly reduced: One of the chief problems

with non-cooperative spectrum sensing is that even though the cognitive radio
may not be able to detect a primary user transmitter, it may still interfere with
receivers who may be able to detect both the primary user and also the
cognitive radio system transmissions. By using a cooperative sensing system,
it is possible to reduce the possibility of this happening because a greater

30
 number of receivers will be able to build up a might more accurate picture of
the transmissions in the area.

 Increase in agility: An increase in the number of spectrum sensing nodes by

cooperation enables the sensing to be more accurate and better options for
channel moves to be processed, thereby providing an increase in agility.

 Reduced false alarms: By having multiple nodes performing the spectrum

sensing, channel signal detection is more accurate and this reduces the number
of false alarms.

 More accurate signal detection: Cooperative spectrum sensing provides for

more accurate signal detection and a greater reliability of the overall system.

There are many advantages to incorporating a cooperative spectrum sensing system

within a cognitive radio network wherever possible.

5.4 System Requirements for Cooperative Spectrum Sensing

The use of cognitive radio cooperative spectrum sensing provides many advantages,
but to provide this ability there are a number of requirements that need to be provided.
While these may be seen as an overhead and in some instances a disadvantage, the
advantages often outweigh the disadvantages.

 Control channel: In order for the different elements within the cognitive radio
cooperative spectrum sensing network to communicate, a control channel is
required. This will take up a proportion of the overall system bandwidth.

 System synchronisation: It is normally necessary to provide synchronisation

between all the nodes within the cognitive radio cooperative spectrum sensing
network. This is to keep the channel free from transmissions from the cognitive
network while sensing is under way. In some instances adaptive scheduling of
the sense period may prove beneficial. In this way the dead time arising from
sense periods can be minimised within the need to ensuring the sensing is
undertaken sufficiently well. Accurate spectrum sensing requires a longer

31
 period of time than a rough sense to see if a strong signal has returned. By
adapting the sense periods, channel throughput can be maximised, although
there is a greater need to maintain synchronisation under these circumstances.

 Suitable geographical spread of cooperating nodes: In order to gain the

optimum sensing from the cooperating nodes within the cognitive network, it
is necessary to obtain the best geographical spread. In this way the hidden node
syndrome can be minimised, and the most accurate spectrum sensing can be
gained.

5.5 Challenges of Spectrum Sensing

In this section we are about to point out some challenges and other issues that spectrum
sensing must face so as the CR to have a proper operation.

Hardware Requirements: Spectrum sensing for CR applications requires high

sampling rate, high resolution analog-to-digital converters (ADC) with large dynamic
range and high-speed signal processors. On the one hand, the noise interference
problem is easier for these purposes as receivers are tuned to receive signals that are
transmitted over a desired bandwidth. Moreover, simple receivers are capable of
processing narrowband baseband signals with low complexity and power
consumption. On the other hand, CR terminals are required to process transmission
over a much wider band for utilizing any opportunity. Hence, CR should be able to
capture and analyze a relatively larger band for identifying spectrum opportunities.
Thus, additional requirements on the components in radio frequency (RF) bands, such
as antennas and power amplifiers, are needed and they must operate in a wide range
of frequencies.

Hidden Primary User Problem: This is a very serious problem for a CR user and it
can be caused by many factors including severe multipath fading and shadowing
observed by secondary users while scanning for primary users’ transmissions. Figure
3.3 shows an illustration of a hidden node problem where the dashed circles show the
operating ranges of the primary user and the cognitive radio device. In this example,
the CR causes unwanted interference to the PU because the CR is outside of the
transmission coverage area of the PU.

32
Sensing Periodicity: While utilizing a white space, the SU should continue to
periodically sense the desired band (e.g. every Tp) in case a PU starts to transmit. The
sensing period, Tp, determines the maximum time during which the CR will not be
aware of a reappearing PU and may interfere with it. Therefore, Tp plays a key role
for the QoS of the licensed user.

Figure 5.2: The hidden licensed user problem in cognitive radio systems. [Yucek and Arslan:
“A survey of spectrum sensing algorithms for cognitive radio applications”]

The CR cannot simultaneously sense the band and transmit, so secondary transmission
and sensing of the band must be combined properly. While from the regulator’s
perspective it suffices for the SU to monitor the band and make a decision whether
there is or not a PU signal once every Tp, for the CR it is desired to maintain sensing
time well below Tp, in order to have time for its transmission.

Noise Uncertainty: It is not always available for a CR to know a priori the noise
power, so the receiver must estimate it by itself. Unfortunately, calibration errors as
well as changes in thermal noise caused by temperature variations limit the accuracy
with which noise power can be estimated. Thus, the detection sensitivity, defined as
the minimum SNR at which the PU’s signal can be accurately detected, must be
calculated with the worst case noise assumption which leads to a more sensitive
detector.

33
CHAPTER 6
Results and Discussion

Here we have first tried to compare the two spectrum detection techniques i.e energy
detection and matched filter detection and also tried to prove that how cooperative
sensing is better than non-cooperative sensing. Then we have compared the received
power by varying probability of false alarm and shown how with increasing alpha,
agility gain decreases. Now, we are trying to develop a security solution for detection
of malicious secondary users and how it will lead to a hassle free communication. The
aim of having chosen this project is to study about cooperative spectrum sensing and
provide security in cognitive radio networks[1,2]. Thus, we aim to provide an efficient
way for spectrum sensing using energy detection method. But this can lead to
unauthorized and unlawful usage of spectrum creating various challenges and threats.
Here, we propose a security model for ensuring secure communication between any
two entities in the network. The cooperative spectrum sensing in cognitive radio has
been studied from various sources. All the basic ideas has been studied from few
papers about the working of Cognitive Radio[5] and then while studying these I came
across various security challenges in Cognitive radio. So working and thinking further
on that, we thought of a security model for ensuring a better and hassle free
communication in the network.

6.1 Energy Detection vs Matched Filter Detection

In this section we are comparing the performance of the ED to the one of the MF
Detector. In the experiment we create a random signal and then we use it for the
evaluation of the detection performance of each of these two methods. We compute
the threshold and the test statistic of each of the methods (with the same signal we
created before) and then we evaluate the PD and the PF A in the same way as in
Chapter 4. Visually, the comparison of ED and MF is shown in Figure 5.1 for SNR =
−6 dB, in Figure 5.2 for SNR = 0 dB and in Figure 5.3 for SNR = 2 dB.
From these figures we can observe that the MF has better detection performance than
the ED for any SNR. This is reasonable, as in the MF detection we know information

34
about the PU’s signal a priori and the MF correlates the already known primary signal
with the received signal to detect the presence of the PU. On the other hand, ED has
no a priori information on the source signal.

It simply treats the PU’s signal as noise and decides on the presence or absence of the
primary signal based on the energy of the observed signal.

Figure 6.1: Comparison of Energy Detector and Matched Filter Detector for
SNR = −6 dB

6.2 Comparison of Non cooperative and Cooperative Sensing

We have compared the cooperative and non-cooperative scenarios by comparing it’s
received signal power. We can clearly see from the 3rd graph that with cooperation, the
detection time taken by secondary users to detect primary users decreases. This gives
us a better usage of spectrum compared to non-cooperative scenario. Also, we have

35
plotted graph for agility gain v/s the received signal power for various probability of
false alarm. From results we can clearly observe that with increasing probability of
false alarm, the agility gain decreases

Figure 6.2: Agility gain in two user network scheme under constrained scheme

36
Figure 6.3: Agility gain in two user network scheme with varying alpha i.e
with alpha values 0.1, 0.15, & 0.2

37
Figure 6.4: Detection time comparison with and without cooperation

38
6.3 Developed Algorithm for Security
CASE I
Consider N number of secondary users, comprising both honest and malicious user
with a fusion center(FC). Initially, on the call of fusion center each secondary user will
send their local decision value of sensing to the FC. Fusion center assigns random
reliability for each secondary user and will collect all the local decision value and
calculates the global decision, on the basis of the local decision value of individual SU
along with their reliability, which is different at different time slot. This random
reliability is also used as IT(Information Tag) communicated with each users in
encrypted form. Now, each authorized secondary user will decrypt the identification
tag and send that decrypted tag with their next local decision. Here malicious user,
which is not authorized will not be able to decrypt properly and it will send wrong
decrypted tag with its local sensing information. This will help FC to detect malicious
user and it will discard that user for next chain of sensing. [2]

CASE II
Suppose, malicious user is somehow able to decrypt an identification tag, then
reliability of each is calculated and later depending upon its wrong information
reliability is reduced. Let Ui be the reliability of each secondary user then after its each
decision:

here Z and yi is 1 bit global and local decision. Hence, if global and local decision is
different than ex-or value will be 1 and reliability will decrease and for same decisions
with ex-or value 0, reliability will increase. Reliability of each secondary user will start
decreasing depending upon its local decision with respect to global decision. We will
keep one particular threshold, if value of Ui becomes less than that, secondary user
will be declared as a malicious, and will be stopped from sending reports to FC. [11]
Fig. 6.5 is the Flowchart of our proposed Security Model.

39
Figure 6.5: Proposed Security Flowchart

40
CHAPTER 7
7.1 CONCLUSION AND FUTURE SCOPE

We see that allowing unlicensed user to use the empty spectrum has created a new
wave in the developments towards the efficient usage of spectrum. This increases the
importance of the techniques used for spectrum sensing and we have created a block
called detector block which we are using to sense the spectrum and take corresponding
decision based on the availability of the free spectrum. We have used eigen value-
based energy detection method for spectrum sensing since it requires least information
to take decisions i.e. it requires only the noise to detect the presence of primary user in
the spectrum. The only limitation in this part was that we have worked using only 2
nodes, one primary user and one secondary user. The future enhancements in this can
be done by increasing the number of nodes participating in the spectrum sensing i.e.
by implementing collaborative sensing, where many secondary users' information is
clubbed together for better and reliable decision.

Further, there is a demand of a secure communication free from any malicious activity.
This is possible if we make the communication safe using cryptography. Here we have
used a simple a Cesar's algorithm to encrypt the messages. This has been done in an
multicast topology. We see that all the reliable and legal users can decrypt the
encrypted signals and send back acknowledgment. The CASE II of the stated
algorithm can provide much better security, if implemented. Further enhancement on
the implementation can be to use a better algorithm for encryption of signals.

In conclusion, Cognitive Radio is an evolving technology and we can expect more

advancements in security of the same.

41
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