A hybrid cryptosystem based on WEP for 802.11 networks. (c2006)

Abstract

Wireless is the next generation networking technology. The security of such technology is very critical because its physical layer is the electro-magnetic waves that can be easily intercepted by anyone. The original security protocol for 802.11 wireless networks is called \VEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy), it is a symmetric-key encryption algorithm that is based on RC4 (Rivest Cipher 4). Unfortunately this protocol had many flaws that made it exposed to many attacks. This thesis presents a set of improvements for WEP: these improvements convert WEP to a hybrid cryptosystem, a system that is based on both a symmetric-key algorithm and an asymmetric-key algorithm.