Analysis of 3G Mobile Security
2001-2002

This project was funded through Motorola and undertaken by Software Research Group.
Department of Computer Science
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Project Description

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Project Description

Third generation mobile systems such as UMTS revolutionized telecommunications technology by offering mobile users content rich services, wireless broadband access to Internet, and worldwide roaming. The users will be able to enjoy Voice-over-IP, multimedia messaging, and video conferencing services with up to 2 Mbps data rate. However the broadcast nature of the wireless communication and increased popularity of wireless devices introduce serious security vulnerabilities. Mobile users and providers must be assured of the correct identity of the communicating party; user and signaling data must be protected with confidentiality and integrity mechanisms. The goal of this project is to evaluate current 3G security protocols, implement security features outlined in these protocols, analyze the impact of security deployment upon the network performance.

The project is realized in three parts:

Part I

Design a 3G mobile network to be simulated. Decide the size of the network, type of nodes to be used, physical aspects of these nodes, protocol stacks within each node, and finally applications to be run on these nodes. Simulate the designed network using our simulation tool, OPNET Modeler, and collect performance statistics such as end-to-end packet delay, service setup delay, and bandwidth utilization.

Part II

Study existing Third Generation specifications and related publications. Design and implement security mechanisms such as authentication, encryption, and integrity for the simulated network. Collect performance statistics with the security mechanisms in place.

Part III

Compare and analyze the performance results for both scenarios (with and without security). Outline research directions for further study.

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Tools

In this project, we are utilizing OPNET Modeler to simulate a wireless network and implement security features of 3G systems. OPNET Modeler is a commercial software which allows one to design and study communication networks, protocols, and applications in a flexible, realistic environment. It provides powerful tools to define, collect, and analyze various statistics on the simulated network model.

The image on the left shows a wireless system consisting of two small serving networks connected by Internet. We used this model in our simulation as an example of a lightly loaded network. The mobile stations are communicating with each other using Voice-over-IP application, and also they are downloading web pages from the web server.

Simulation results can be presented as an animation, graph, or a web report. The graph on the right compares end-to-end (i.e. mobile station to mobile station) packet delay statistics for the network model shown above. These statistics relate to the Voice-over-IP traffic.