MREA: a minimum resource expenditure node capture attack in wireless sensor networks

Because of the stochastic key pre-distribution and complicated network topology, designing an energy-efficient node capture attack algorithm is of great challenge. Although many algorithms have been proposed for node capture attack, previous methods lack of concerning minimizing resource expenditure in modeling attacking behavior. In this paper, we propose a novel way of modeling the node capture attack. First, we transform the problem into a set covering problem with a shortest Hamiltonian cycle problem, which has been shown to be NP-hard. Consequently, we also develop a heuristic called minimum resource expenditure node capture attack (MREA) to maximize destructiveness while minimizing resource expenditure. Moreover, extensive simulations are conducted to show the performance of MREA. Simulation results show that MREA outperforms other algorithms in reducing the attack rounds and saving resource expenditure. Copyright (C) 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.