Vulnerability Analysis and Defenses in Wireless Networks

This chapter shows that the security challenges posed by the 802.11 wireless networks are manifold and it is therefore important to explore the various vulnerabilities that are present with such networks. Along with other security vulnerabilities, defense against denial of service attacks is a critical component of any security system. Unlike wired networks where denial of service attacks has been extensively studied, there is a lack of research for preventing such attacks in wireless networks. In addition to various vulnerabilities, some factors leading to different types of denial of service (DoS) attacks and some defense mechanisms are discussed in this chapter. This can help to better understand the wireless network vulnerabilities and subsequently more techniques and procedures to combat these attacks may be developed by researchers.