Advanced Topics in

Computer Networks

Lecture 4
Mobile IP

Lecturer
Dr. Seyed Reza Kamel
 Why Mobile Computing?
 Seamless, ubiquitous network access for mobile
hosts
◦ Laptop computers
◦ PDAs
◦ Electronic books
Why Mobile IP?

 Need a protocol which allows network

connectivity across host movement
 Protocol to enable mobility must not
require massive changes to router
software, etc.
 Must be compatible with large installed
base of IPv4 networks/hosts
 Confine changes to mobile hosts and a
few support hosts which enable mobility
 Why Mobile IP (Cont.)
 Trends: People’s perspective of looking at Internet has changed
from ages, with the introduction of Mobility.

 Need: Increase in the variety of mobile devices, such as PDA’s,

laptops and cellular phones, more and more internet services are
accessible to moving users with the widely deployed wireless
networks.

 Gen X (New Generations): 3G Networks, Mobile IPV6

 Why Mobile IP ?
CN is successfully communicating with MN via
HA Correspondent node (CN)
Packets for MN are dropped by
the Home Agent as Mobile node
Mobile node (MN) is not present in its network

Router
Home Agent (HA)

Mobile Node moves to remote network

Remote Agent (RA)
Mobile IP: Basics
 Proposed by IETF (Internet Engineering Task
Force)
◦ Standards development body for the Internet
 Mobile IP allows a mobile host to move about
without changing its permanent IP address
 Each mobile host has a home agent on its home
network
 Mobile host establishes a care-of address when
it's away from home
Mobile IP: Basics, Cont.
 Correspondent host is a host that wants to
send packets to the mobile host
 Correspondent host sends packets to the mobile
host’s IP permanent address
 These packets are routed to the mobile host’s
home network
 Home agent forwards IP packets for mobile host
to current care-of address
 Mobile host sends packets directly to
correspondent, using permanent home IP as
source IP
 Mobile IP: Basics, Cont.

To MN Home
Address

correspondent host home agent

 Mobile IP: Basics, Cont.

To MN Care-of
Address

correspondent host home agent

 Mobile IP: Basics, Cont.

From MN Home Reply goes

Address Directly

correspondent host home agent

Mobile IP: Care-of Addresses
 Whenever a mobile host connects to a remote
network, two choices:
◦ care-of can be the address of a foreign agent on the
remote network
 foreign agent delivers packets forwarded from home agent
to mobile host
◦ care-of can be a temporary, foreign IP address obtained
through, e.g., DHCP
 home agent tunnels packets directly to the temporary IP
address
 Regardless, care-of address must be registered
with home agent
 Mobile IP Architecture
Correspondent node (CN)

Home Agent (HA) Remote Agent (RA) Mobile node (MN)

Entities in Mobile IP
 Mobile Node (MN) - A Node moving to different network, with permanent Home Address.
 Home Agent (HA) - A router on a mobile node's home network which tunnels datagrams for delivery to the
mobile node when it is away from home, and maintains current location information for the mobile node.

 Home Address - The static fixed IP Address allocated to a mobile node by Home Agent.
 Home Network - A network, having a network prefix/network id.matching that of a mobile node's home
address
 Foriegn Network - A network other than a Mobile node’s home network.
 Foreign Agent - Router in foreign network that provides CoA and tunneling with HA and forward the
packets to MN.
 Care-of Address - Termination point of a tunnel toward a MN in the foreign netwrok.
 Mobility Binding - The association of a home address with a care-of address (CoA).
 Correspondent Node (CN) - A peer node with which a Mobile node is communicating.
How Mobile IP works ?
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

HA
MN
Mobility Binding Table
How Mobile IP works ?
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

2. FA Relays Registration request to HA

2
1

HA
MN
Mobility Binding Table
How Mobile IP works ?
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

2. FA Relays Registration request to HA

2
3. HA sends Registration reply to FA 1
3

HA
MN
Mobility Binding Table
How Mobile IP works ?
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

2. FA Relays Registration request to HA

2
3. HA sends Registration reply to FA 1
4 3
4. FA Relays Registration reply to MN

HA
MN
Mobility Binding Table
IP-in-IP Tunneling
 Packet to be forwarded is encapsulated
in a new IP packet
 In the new header:
◦ Destination = care-of-address
◦ Source = address of home agent
◦ Protocol number = IP-in-IP

IP header IP header
data IP header
data
At the Other End...
 Depending on type of care-of address:
◦ Foreign agent or
◦ Mobile host
 … strips outer IP header of tunneled
packet, which is then fed to the mobile
host
 Challenges! Aside: Any thoughts on
advantages of foreign agent vs. co-located
(foreign IP) address?
Tunneling in Mobile IP
CN sends packets to HA
Correspondent node (CN)

Home Agent (HA) IP-in-IP or GRE tunnel

between HA and FA

HA tunnels the
Packet and sends to FA
MN moves to FA Foreign Agent(FA)

FA extracts original
Packet and sends to the MN

Mobile Node (MN)

 Problems with Mobile IP
Challenges! Routing Inefficiency
 Suboptimal “triangle” routing
◦ What if MN is in same subnetwork as the node to
which it is communicating (CN) and HA is on the
other side of the world?
 It would be nice if we could directly route packets
Challenges! Routing Inefficiency

Mobile host and correspondent

host might even be on the
same network!!

correspondent host home agent

 Route Optimizations
 Possible Solution:
◦ Home agent sends current care-of address to
correspondent host
◦ Correspondent host caches care-of address
◦ Future packets tunneled directly to care-of address
 But!
◦ An instance of the cache consistency problem arises...
◦ Cached care-of address becomes stale when the
mobile host moves
◦ Potential security issues with providing care-of address
to correspondent
Possible Route Optimization
Problems with Mobile IP
Challenges! Ingress Filtering
 Many border router discard packets coming from within the
enterprise if the packets do not contain a source IP address
configured for one of the enterprise’s internal network

 Mobile node would otherwise use their home address as the

source IP address of the packets they transmit

 Possible solution: tunneling outgoing packets from the care-

of address
 where is the target for the tunneled packets from the
mobile node? Home agent?
 ? Packets Dropped due to "Ingress" Filtering

correspondent host home agent

Problems with Mobile IP
Challenges! Routing

Invalid and Ambiguous Routing

 If Correspondent & home agent on
same network. Packet from mobile
? host is deemed
"topologically incorrect"

Source &
Destination
Addresses are from
the same network

correspondent host home agent

Problems with Mobile IP
Registration
 Redundancy: What if the home agent
doesn't answer a registration request?
◦ Registration request to broadcast address
◦ Rejection carries new home agent ID
Problems facing Mobile IP
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

HA
MN
Problems facing Mobile IP
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

2. FA Relays Registration request to HA

2
1

HA
MN
Problems facing Mobile IP
Registration
1. Registration Request by MN to FA FA

2. FA Relays Registration request to HA

2
3. HA Rejects the registration 1
?

HA
Possible Solutions: Reject… MN
• Introduces New Agent
• FA starts Broadcast search for New Agent
Problems facing Mobile IP
Challenges: Security Issues
There are many ….

 Bogus registration (denial of service) attacks

◦ Malicious host sends fake registration messages to
home agent "on behalf" of the mobile host
◦ Packets could be forwarded to malicious host or
to the bit bucket
 Bogus Registration Attack

Send packets to me!!

????

Hehehehe!!

registration request
Madame Evil
home agent
Authentication
 Tofix this problem, authenticate
registration attempts
◦ Use private key encryption to generate
a message digest
◦ Home agent applies private key to
message to see if message digest is
identical
Authentication, Cont.
private key
… care-of address…

digest

???

home agent
Replay Attacks!

home agent

"…mooohahahahahahahaha!!!!!"
 Avoiding Replay Attacks
 Avoid replay attacks by making registration
requests un-replayable
◦ Add estimate of local time or a pseudo-random
number to registration request/reply
◦ If time estimate or random number is not the
expected number, provide info in "NO!" reply for
resynchronization
◦ Insufficient information to help malicious host
 Security in Mobile IP - Solutions
 Authentication can be performed by all parties
◦ Only authentication between MN and HA is required
◦ Authenticity and Integrity of Registration messages using
Authentication (e.g. HMAC-MD5)

 Replay protection
◦ Timestamps are mandatory
◦ Random numbers on request reply packets are optional
◦ Sending messages using sequence number

 HA and FA do not have to share any security

information
Security in Mobile IP - Solutions
o Required -as Mobile Nodes are often in unprotected
remote network

Security Issues and solutions in Mobile IP

Issue Protocol Solution
Optional authentication between MN and IPv4 AAA and Broker
FA AAA services
Location Privacy IPv4,IPv6 None

Confidentiality for Data Packets IPv4,IPv6 IPSec or SSL

 Security in Mobile IP
(Confidentiality for Data Packets)
IPSec for Data Confidentiality

Correspondent node (CN)

Home Agent (HA) Remote Agent (RA) Mobile node (MN)

IPSec Tunnel

Mobile IP Tunnel (IP-in-IP or GRE)

 Security in Mobile IP (AAA)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS)

Remote AAA
Broker AAA

Home AAA

Remote Agent (RA)

Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
 Security in Mobile IP (Cont.)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS)

Remote AAA
Broker AAA
2
Home AAA

Remote Agent (RA)

1
Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
 Security in Mobile IP (Cont.)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS)
3
Remote AAA
4
Broker AAA
2
Home AAA

Remote Agent (RA)

1
Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
 Security in Mobile IP (Cont.)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS)
3
Remote AAA
4
Broker AAA
2
Home AAA

5
Remote Agent (RA)

1
Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
 Security in Mobile IP (Cont.)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS) 8
7 3
Remote AAA
4
Broker AAA
2
Home AAA

5 6
Remote Agent (RA)

1
Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
 Security in Mobile IP (Cont.)

Mobile IP with AAA (e.g.

RADIUS) 8
7 3
Remote AAA
4
Broker AAA
2 9
Home AAA

5 6
Remote Agent (RA)

1 10
Home Agent (HA)

Registration Request
Registration Response
Mobile node (MN)
Problems with Mobile IP
Other Challenges!
 How does the mobile host get a remote
IP?
◦ Router advertisements, DHCP, manual...
 How can a mobile host tell where it is?
◦ Am I at home?
◦ Am I visiting a foreign network?
◦ Have I moved?
◦ What if I'm in two places at once?
 Problems with Mobile IP
Other Challenges!
 Single HA model is fragile
◦ Possible solution – have multiple HA
 Frequent reports to HA if MN is moving
◦ Possible solution – support of FA clustering
 Security
◦ Connection hijacking, snooping…
 Many other open research questions
 Conclusions...
 Great potential for mobile application deployment
using Mobile IP
 Minimizes impact on existing Internet infrastructure
 Security issues being looked at
 (Complicated) firewall solutions proposed
 Several working implementations (e.g., Monarch
project at CMU)
 Some things still need work: e.g., integration of
Mobile IP and 802.11 wireless LANs
 Lots of research to do on mobile computing!