ABSTRACT
Recent advances in electronics andwireless network technologies have offered us access to a new era where wireless sensor networks formed by interconnected small intelligent sensing devices provide us the possibility to form smart environments. Considering the specialty of wireless sensor network, the security threats and possible countermeasures are quite different from those in Internet and Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs). On the one hand, the wireless communication, large-scale and possibly human unattended deployment make attacks in wireless sensor networks relatively easier to perform. Furthermore, all features that make sensor nodes cheap and thus sensor network application affordable, such as limited energy resource, limited bandwidth, and limited memory, also makemanywell-developed securitymechanisms inappropriate in sensor networks.On the other hand, the user unfriendly interface makes the physical compromise of a sensor node difficult, the relatively simple communication profile makes the intrusion detection easy to perform, and also the redundant deployment makes the new type of network more fault-tolerant. Thus, we need a complete redesign of sensor network security mechanisms from technique to management.
