An Ontology for Attacks in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

Abstract: Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have many potential applications. In many scenarios WSNs are of interest to adversaries and they become susceptible to some types of attacks since they are deployed in open environments and have limited resources. Many attacks are known against WSNs. Protections exist against some of them but for the others IDS (Intrusion Detection Mechanism) systems are required. In this report, we present a new WSN attacks ontology that enable us to identify the intention of the attacker, his capabilities to achieve the attacks, the target and the end result. This ontology is a high level abstraction that does not depend on the IDS system used. We also survey known vulnerabilities and attacks in WSNs and present some defenses. Key-words: attacks, wireless sensor networks, ontology