Multipath Routing Protocols for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks: Security Issues and Performance Evaluation Rosa Mavropodi and Christos Douligeris ⋆ University of Piraeus, Department of Informatics, 80 Karaoli & Dimitriou, Piraeus 185 34, Greece {rosa, cdoulig}@unipi.gr Abstract. The evolution of wireless network technologies and mobile computing hardware made possible the introduction of various appli- cations in mobile ad hoc networks. These applications have increased requirements regarding security and the acceptable delays in order to provide high quality services. Multipath routing protocols were designed to address these challenges. With the use of multiple paths for the com- munication between a source and a destination, the autonomic user be- comes almost unaware of a possible network failure, due to security attacks or link collapses. Several secure multipath routing protocols have been proposed but little performance information and extensive compar- isons are available. In this paper, we briefly describe some security issues that multipath routing protocols face and we evaluate the performance of three existing secure routing protocols under different traffic conditions and mobility patterns. 1 Introduction Mobile ad hoc networks have received great attention in recent years, mainly due to the evolution of wireless networking and mobile computing hardware that made possible the introduction of various applications. These applications have increased requirements in order to ensure high quality for the provided services. Security in such infrastructureless networks has been proven to be a challenging task. Multipath routing protocols were initially proposed in order to design robust and secure networks. The maintenance of multiple routes towards a destination prevents initiation of a new path discovery from the source node each time there is a link failure, due to a network fault or a malicious attack. In addition, the existence of multiple paths may prevent node congestion, since it may balances the traffic load through alternative routes. Routing protocols may generally be categorized as table driven (often called proactive) and source initiated (or on-demand). In table driven protocols ⋆ This work has been supported in part by the IST FET Coordination Action ACCA (006475). I. Stavrakakis and M. Smirnov (Eds.): WAC 2005, LNCS 3854, pp. 165–176, 2006. The original version of this chapter was revised: The copyright line was incorrect.This has been corrected. The Erratum to this chapter is available at DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-32993-0 29 © 2006 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg