Secure Cooperation of Mobile Sensors in an Underwater Acoustic Network

Methodologies and algorithms are presented for the secure cooperation of a team of mobile underwater sensors, connected through an acoustic communication network, within surveillance and patrolling applications. The work proposes a cooperative algorithm where the mobile underwater sensors (installed on Autonomous Underwater Vehicles – AUVs) respond to simple local rules based on the available information to perform the mission and maintain the communication link with the network. The algorithm is intrinsically robust, in the sense that with loss of communication among the vehicles the coverage performance (i.e., the mission goal) is degraded but not lost. The cooperative algorithm relies however on the fact that the available information from the other sensors, though not necessarily complete, is trustworthy. To ensure trustworthiness, a secure communication suite has been designed specifically oriented to the underwater scenario.