Enhancing Physical Layer Security in Relay

Networks

By
Marryam Nawaz
CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB

MS Thesis
In
Electrical Engineering

COMSATS University Islamabad

Pakistan
Fall, 2018
 COMSATS University Islamabad

Enhancing Physical Layer Security in Relay

Networks

A Thesis presented to
COMSATS University Islamabad

In partial fulfillment of
the requirement for the degree of

MS (Electrical Engineering)

By

Marryam Nawaz
CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB

Fall, 2018

ii
 Enhancing Physical Layer Security in Relay
Networks

A graduate thesis submitted to the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering as

partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of Degree of MS (Electrical
Engineering).

Name Registration Number

Marryam Nawaz FA16-REE-038

Supervisor
Dr. Guftaar Ahmad,
Assistant Professor,
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
COMSATS University Islamabad
December, 2018.

iii
 Final Approval

This thesis titled

Enhancing Physical Layer Security in Relay

Networks

By
Marryam Nawaz
CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB
Has been approved
For the COMSATS University Islamabad

External Examiner: ____________________________________________________

Supervisor: ____________________________________________________
Dr. Guftaar Ahmad
Assistant Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
COMSATS University Islamabad

Head of Department: ___________________________________________________

Dr. M. Junaid Mughal
Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
COMSATS University Islamabad

Declaration
iv
I Marryam Nawaz, CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB hereby declare that I have produced the
work presented in this thesis, during the scheduled period of study. I also declare that I
have not taken any material from any source except referred to wherever due that amount
of plagiarism is within acceptable range. If a violation of HEC rules on research has
occurred in this thesis, I shall be liable to punishable action under the plagiarism rules of
the HEC.

Date: _______________ Signature of the student:

Marryam Nawaz
CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB

v
 Certificate

It is certified that Marryam Nawaz, CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB has carried out all the work
related to this thesis under my supervision at Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, COMSATS University Islamabad and the work fulfills the requirement for
award of the MS degree.

Date: ____________________

Supervisor:

Dr. Guftaar Ahmad

Assistant Professor

Head of Department:
__________________________
Dr. M. Junaid Mughal
Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

vi
 DEDICATION

To

My Dearest Parents, Siblings, Other Family Members and

Supervisor.

Their prayers and support have helped me to

achieve this milestone.

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First and foremost, all praise is due to ALLAH the most beneficent the most gracious. He
has given me the health, strength, knowledge and the patience to accomplish my work.
I would like to show my deepest gratitude to my Supervisor Dr. Guftaar Ahmad for his
continuous efforts, support, provision and help throughout my thesis. It has been a great
pleasure for me to work with him. He made me able to develop research skills. He has
always been the source of guideline and motivation for me from the past two years.
Words are powerless to express that how grateful I am to my parents. Where I stand
today is all due to the continuous inspiration and sacrifices of my father, love and care of
my mother. I would also like to express my sincere thanks to my brother and all my
friends for their concern throughout my masters studies.

Marryam Nawaz
CIIT/FA16-REE-038/ISB

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 ABSTRACT
Enhancing Physical Layer Security in Relay Networks

Due to the broadcast nature of wireless communication, security of information in

wireless networks is a critical and challenging issue. Physical layer security (PLS) is the
first security solution that exploits the properties of wireless channel to protect the
confidential messages against intruders. Traditional security techniques are limited by the
processing power of the wireless nodes, whereas PLS can achieve communication
secrecy without requiring computationally expensive cryptographic operations. The relay
networks emerge as a promising technology to enhance the performance of wireless
systems. This research intends to improve the PLS in relay networks such that the
message confidentiality and authentication can be achieved in the presence of
eavesdroppers.
In this thesis, we consider the PLS problem in orthogonal frequency division multiple
access (OFDMA) based dual-hop system which consists of multiple users, decode and
forward relays and an intruder. The emphasis of this work will be on maximizing the sum
secrecy rate (SR) by optimizing the relay based transmission through optimal power
loading over source and relays nodes in addition with the suitable subcarrier assignment.
Simulation results are provided to validate the performance of the proposed schemes.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 Physical Layer Security in Wireless Communication.....................................1

1.1 Introduction to Wireless Communication.............................................................2
1.1.1 History of Communication.........................................................................2
1.1.2 Advantages of Wireless Communication Networks..................................4
1.1.3 Challenges in Wireless Communication Networks....................................5
1.2 Overview of Physical Layer Security...................................................................6
1.2.1 Attacks at PHY Layer................................................................................8
1.2.2 Mechanism.................................................................................................9
1.3 Overview of OFDM based Networks.................................................................11
1.4 Introduction to Cooperative Communication.....................................................12
1.4.1 Relaying Protocols...................................................................................13
1.5 Thesis Organization............................................................................................14
2 Introduction to Optimization Methods.............................................................15
2.1 Introduction to Optimization..............................................................................16
2.1.1 Linear and Non-Linear Programming.....................................................16
2.1.2 Convex Optimization Problem................................................................17
2.1.2.1 Convex Function........................................................................17
2.1.2.2 Lagrange Duality Theory...........................................................19
2.1.2.3 Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) conditions....................................20
3 Techniques for Achieving PLS in Relay Networks........................................22
3.1 Introduction to Resource Allocation..................................................................23
3.2 Techniques for Providing PLS...........................................................................24
3.2.1 Resource Optimization...........................................................................24
3.2.2 Artificial Noise Generation....................................................................24
3.2.3 Cooperative Jamming.............................................................................25
3.3 PLS in Relay Networks: Literature Review......................................................26
3.4 Motivation.........................................................................................................29
4 Enhancing PLS using Resource Allocation........................................................30
4.1 Problem Statement.............................................................................................31
4.2 Non-Cooperative Jamming................................................................................31
4.2.1 Proposed System Model..........................................................................31

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 4.2.2 Problem Formulation...............................................................................34
4.2.3 Proposed Optimization Scheme..............................................................36
4.2.3.1 Dual Problem and Dual Decomposition...................................36
4.3 Cooperative Jamming........................................................................................40
4.3.1 Proposed System Model..........................................................................40
4.3.2 Problem Formulation...............................................................................42
4.3.3 Proposed Optimization Scheme..............................................................43
4.3.3.1 Dual Problem and Dual Decomposition....................................43
5 Simulations and Results.........................................................................................46
5.1 Performance Evaluation.....................................................................................47
5.1.1 Results.....................................................................................................48
6 Conclusion and Future Work...............................................................................55
6.1 Conclusion.........................................................................................................56
6.2 Future Research Directions................................................................................56
7 References.................................................................................................................57

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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1.1: Physical layer security attacks. 8
Figure 1.2: System model of PLS 10
Figure 1.3: System model of cooperative communication 12
Figure 1.4: Organization of Thesis 14
Figure 3.1: ANG mechanism 25
Figure 3.2: CJ mechanism 26
Figure 4.1: Proposed system model for PLS without jamming…........………………....32
Figure 4.2: Proposed system model for PLS with cooperative jamming……..…...........41
Figure 5.1: Sum SR versus total available power at source and relays (without jamming)
………………………………………………...……………………….............49
Figure 5.2: Sum SR versus total available power at source and relays (with jamming)….
……….……………………………………………….……………….........49
Figure 5.3: Comparison between optimal and non-optimal scheme (without jamming and
with jamming) …………………...……………………………………………………....50
Figure 5.4: Comparison between optimal, suboptimal and non-optimal scheme (without
jamming and with jamming)..............................................................................................50
Figure 5.5: Effect on sum SR by decreasing the power at relays (without jamming)…..51
Figure 5.6: Effect on sum SR by decreasing the power at relays (with jamming)……...52
Figure 5.7: Comparison between optimal and non-optimal scheme (without jamming and
with jamming)…………………………………………………………….……………...53
Figure 5.8: Comparison between optimal, suboptimal and non-optimal scheme (without
jamming and with jamming)...................................................................................……...53
Figure 5.9: Sum SR versus number of subcarriers (without jamming) ………………...54
Figure 5.10: Sum SR versus number of subcarriers (with jamming)…....……………...54

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xiii
LIST OF TABLES

Table 4.1: Definition of notations......................................................................................33

Table 4.2: Power allocation without jamming at N=8.......................................................39
Table 4.3: Power allocation without jamming at N=16.....................................................40
Table 4.4: Power allocation with jamming at N=8............................................................44
Table 4.5: Power allocation with jamming at N=16..........................................................45

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

QoS Quality of Service

FCC Federal Communications Commission
LANs Local Area Networks
BS Base Station
MS Mobile Station
PHY Physical
FDMA Frequency Division Multiple Access
TDMA Time Division Multiple Access
CDMA Code Division Multiple Access
GSM Global System for Mobile
PLS Physical Layer Security
SR Secrecy Rate
SOP Secrecy Outage Probability
SNR Signal to Noise Ratio
OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
ISI Inter Symbol Interference
CP Cyclic Prefix
IDFT Inverse Discrete Fourier Transform
AF Amplify and Forward
DF Decode and Forward
KKT Karush-Kuhn-Tucker
AWGN Additive White Gaussian Noise
CSI Channel State Information
AN Artificial Noise
CJ Cooperative Jamming
SMORS Secrecy Maximization Oriented Relay Selection

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