Identity-based secure collaboration in wireless ad hoc networks

Voluntary peer collaboration is often assumed in media access, route discovery, packet forwarding, and upper-layer protocols designed for wireless ad hoc networks. This assumption has been seriously challenged when peers are autonomous, selfish, ormalicious in large-scale, heterogeneous networks. In this paper, based on the latest advances in identity-based cryptography, we design a lightweight and cheat-resistant micropayment scheme to stimulate and compensate collaborative peers that sacrifice their resources to relay packets for other peers. We also demonstrate that when security and collaboration measures are properly enforced, profitable collaboration is a preferable strategy for all peers in ad hoc networks. 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.