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Papers by Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam

2019 IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM), 2019

Trilateration and multilateration are important location estimation techniques used in a diverse ... more Trilateration and multilateration are important location estimation techniques used in a diverse range of networks and applications. The system of equations yielded by multilateration can be reduced to simpler linear equations which can be solved to arrive at a closed form analytic solution. Exploiting this solution technique, we develop a novel and unique analytical model for the localization error resulting from trilateration. The analytical model can be used for the analysis of the localization error in all applications wherever multilateration is used for position estimation including internet of things, wireless sensor networks and global navigation satellite system thereby increasing reliability and quality of localization. As an example, we use the analytical model to corroborate the fact that localization error is a function of topology of reference positions in addition to distance estimation errors. The analytical model is verified using simulation experiments.

Current Status and Future Trends, 2012

A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing ... more A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing device, small amount of memory, battery and radio transceiver for communication. The sensor nodes are autonomous and spatially distributed in an area of investigation. Certain applications and protocols of wireless sensor networks require that the sensor nodes should be aware of their position relative to the sensor network. For it to be significant and to be of value, the data such as temperature, humidity and pressure, gathered by sensor nodes must be ascribed to the relative position from where it was collected. For this to happen, the sensor nodes must be aware of their relative positions. Traditional location finding solutions, such as Global Positioning System, are not feasible for wireless sensor nodes due to multiple reasons. Therefore, new methods, techniques and algorithms need to be developed to solve the problem of location and position estimation of wireless sensor nodes. A number of algorithms and techniques based upon different characteristics and properties of sensor nodes have already been proposed for this purpose. This chapter discusses the basic principles and techniques used in the localization algorithms, categories of these algorithms and also takes a more closer look at a few of the representative localization schemes. be placed at a position with known coordinates. The beacon nodes are also called reference nodes, anchor nodes or landmark nodes. It should be noted that sensor nodes may have symmetric or asymmetric communication links. If two nodes u and v are symmetric then u reaches v and v reaches u as well. In the case of asymmetric communication links, either u reaches v or v reaches u but both u and v do not reach each other simultaneously. Let us now consider a sensor network which is symmetric, two-dimensional and arranged in a square shape. Then this sensor network can be represented as a graph G(V, E) where the set of sensor nodes can be represented as set of vertices as under: V = { v1, v2, …, vn } The set of edges E in the graph G(V, E) comprises of all edges e = (i, j)  E iff vi reaches vj i.e. the distance between vi and vj is less than r where r is the maximum distance between the two nodes after which communication between them ceases to exist i.e. if the distance between two nodes is greater than r, no direct communication between them is possible. In other words, if the distance between two nodes is greater than r, the two nodes are not neighbor nodes. The distance between two neighbor nodes vi and vj is defined as the weight w(e)  r of the edge e = (i, j) between them. It is to be noted that problem of localization is usually solved only for two dimensions with the supposition that when needed or deployed, it could be extended to three dimensions. It is for this reason, we have stated graph G(V, E) to be two-dimensional. Therefore, it can be stated that G is a Euclidean graph in which every sensor node has a coordinate (xi, yi)   2 in a two-dimensional space. The coordinate (xi, yi) represents the location of a node i in the given sensor field. The sensor node localization problem can now be stated as following: Let there be a multihop sensor network represented by a graph G = (V, E). The graph has a set of beacon nodes B with known positions given by (xb, yb) for all b  B. The localization problem requires to find the position set (xd, yd) of as many dumb nodes d D as possible. Finding the location of a node implies finding its latitude, longitude and altitude.

In many applications of industrial wireless sensor networks, sensor nodes need to determine their... more In many applications of industrial wireless sensor networks, sensor nodes need to determine their own geographic position coordinates so that the collected data can be ascribed to the location from where it was gathered. We propose a novel intelligent localization algorithm which uses variable range beacon signals generated by varying the transmission power of beacon nodes. The algorithm does not use any additional hardware resources for ranging and estimates position using only radio connectivity by passively listening to the beacon signals. The algorithm is distributed, so each sensor node determines its own position and communication overhead is avoided. As the beacon nodes do not always transmit at maximum power and no transmission power is used by unknown sensor nodes for localization, the proposed algorithm is energy efficient. It also provides control over localization granularity. Simulation results show that the algorithm provides good accuracy under varying radio conditions.

Free and open source software provides an alternative to commercial software. This presentation g... more Free and open source software provides an alternative to commercial software. This presentation gives an overview of the advantages of adopting free and open source software by public organizations in a country, specially Pakistan.

There is no denying the fact that with the widespread usage of computers and the Internet in our ... more There is no denying the fact that with the widespread usage of computers and the Internet in our daily lives, security of information and data has gained increased attention. Information stored in electronic form is more susceptible to being leaked to unauthorized individuals intentionally or without intent. One of the major reasons for this breach of security has been attributed to proprietary software whose source is available only to the company which made it. Thus you have no surety that the proprietary and pre-compiled software has no hole to help an individual break security of your computer or network. Philosophy of free and open source software as against this provides everyone an opportunity to view the source code for any possible vulnerabilities and compile and change it according to ones need. This paper discusses this philosophy in length with some examples and also some open source tools that help maintain computer and Internet security.

Revolution in the area of information technology has brought about changes in many spheres of lif... more Revolution in the area of information technology has brought about changes in many spheres of life. Today, information systems are being used in very sensitive areas such as defence and missile control systems, nuclear plants, etc. Not only has it changed how business is conducted, it has also brought about entirely new paradigms like that of information and cyber warfare. Similarly, one of the many impacts that it has made, is how wars are fought. For all what it has contributed, the information stored on digital devices and computers has become a precious resource and special measures are taken to guard it against attacks from malicious users. These special measures are needed by any enterprise be it a business firm, a commercial entity, a government agency or a military organization. However, requirements and specifications for information security and assurance for a military organization are essentially different from those of commercial or business applications. This paper hig...

This paper presents the verified methodology for wireless authentication system using infrared ba... more This paper presents the verified methodology for wireless authentication system using infrared barcode based scanner. An alternate approach of scanning a barcode using an infrared communication is implemented here, comprises of a card on which a barcode is printed is illuminated with an infrared beam. The reflections from the card are received by an infrared receiver and transmit them to a remote machine over wireless channel where the retrieve information is further processed and converted into the corresponding barcode digits which are further matched against the database stored in the server and the authenticity of the user is established. The system developed is cost-effective, efficient, provide double security and robust.

Not long ago, it was thought that only software applications and general purpose digital systems ... more Not long ago, it was thought that only software applications and general purpose digital systems i.e. computers were prone to various types of attacks against their security. The underlying hardware, hardware implementations of these software applications, embedded systems, and hardware devices were considered to be secure and out of reach of these attacks. However, during the previous few years, it has been demonstrated that novel attacks against the hardware and embedded systems can also be mounted. Not only viruses, but worms and Trojan horses have been developed for them, and they have also been demonstrated to be effective. Whereas a lot of research has already been done in the area of security of general purpose computers and software applications, hardware and embedded systems security is a relatively new and emerging area of research. This chapter provides details of various types of existing attacks against hardware devices and embedded systems, analyzes existing design methodologies for their vulnerability to new types of attacks, and along the way describes solutions and countermeasures against them for the design and development of secure systems.

A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing ... more A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing device, small amount of memory, battery and radio transceiver for communication. The sensor nodes are autonomous and spatially distributed in an area of investigation. Certain applications and protocols of wireless sensor networks require that the sensor nodes should be aware of their position relative to the sensor network. For it to be significant and to be of value, the data such as temperature, humidity and pressure, gathered by sensor nodes must be ascribed to the relative position from where it was collected. For this to happen, the sensor nodes must be aware of their relative positions. Traditional location finding solutions, such as Global Positioning System, are not feasible for wireless sensor nodes due to multiple reasons. Therefore, new methods, techniques and algorithms need to be developed to solve the problem of location and position estimation of wireless sensor nodes. A number of algorithms and techniques based upon different characteristics and properties of sensor nodes have already been proposed for this purpose. This chapter discusses the basic principles and techniques used in the localization algorithms, categories of these algorithms and also takes a more closer look at a few of the representative localization schemes.

We propose a localization algorithm for wireless sensor networks, which is simple in design, does... more We propose a localization algorithm for wireless sensor networks, which is simple in design, does not involve significant overhead and yet provides acceptable position estimates of sensor nodes. The algorithm uses settled nodes as beacon nodes so as to increase the number of beacon nodes. The algorithm is range free and does not need any additional piece of hardware for ranging. It also does not involve any significant communication overhead for localization. The simulation and results show that good localization accuracy is achieved for outdoor environments.

inproceedings by Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam

2019 IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM), 2019

Trilateration and multilateration are important location estimation techniques used in a diverse ... more Trilateration and multilateration are important location estimation techniques used in a diverse range of networks and applications. The system of equations yielded by multilateration can be reduced to simpler linear equations which can be solved to arrive at a closed form analytic solution. Exploiting this solution technique, we develop a novel and unique analytical model for the localization error resulting from trilateration. The analytical model can be used for the analysis of the localization error in all applications wherever multilateration is used for position estimation including internet of things, wireless sensor networks and global navigation satellite system thereby increasing reliability and quality of localization. As an example, we use the analytical model to corroborate the fact that localization error is a function of topology of reference positions in addition to distance estimation errors. The analytical model is verified using simulation experiments.

Current Status and Future Trends, 2012

A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing ... more A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing device, small amount of memory, battery and radio transceiver for communication. The sensor nodes are autonomous and spatially distributed in an area of investigation. Certain applications and protocols of wireless sensor networks require that the sensor nodes should be aware of their position relative to the sensor network. For it to be significant and to be of value, the data such as temperature, humidity and pressure, gathered by sensor nodes must be ascribed to the relative position from where it was collected. For this to happen, the sensor nodes must be aware of their relative positions. Traditional location finding solutions, such as Global Positioning System, are not feasible for wireless sensor nodes due to multiple reasons. Therefore, new methods, techniques and algorithms need to be developed to solve the problem of location and position estimation of wireless sensor nodes. A number of algorithms and techniques based upon different characteristics and properties of sensor nodes have already been proposed for this purpose. This chapter discusses the basic principles and techniques used in the localization algorithms, categories of these algorithms and also takes a more closer look at a few of the representative localization schemes. be placed at a position with known coordinates. The beacon nodes are also called reference nodes, anchor nodes or landmark nodes. It should be noted that sensor nodes may have symmetric or asymmetric communication links. If two nodes u and v are symmetric then u reaches v and v reaches u as well. In the case of asymmetric communication links, either u reaches v or v reaches u but both u and v do not reach each other simultaneously. Let us now consider a sensor network which is symmetric, two-dimensional and arranged in a square shape. Then this sensor network can be represented as a graph G(V, E) where the set of sensor nodes can be represented as set of vertices as under: V = { v1, v2, …, vn } The set of edges E in the graph G(V, E) comprises of all edges e = (i, j)  E iff vi reaches vj i.e. the distance between vi and vj is less than r where r is the maximum distance between the two nodes after which communication between them ceases to exist i.e. if the distance between two nodes is greater than r, no direct communication between them is possible. In other words, if the distance between two nodes is greater than r, the two nodes are not neighbor nodes. The distance between two neighbor nodes vi and vj is defined as the weight w(e)  r of the edge e = (i, j) between them. It is to be noted that problem of localization is usually solved only for two dimensions with the supposition that when needed or deployed, it could be extended to three dimensions. It is for this reason, we have stated graph G(V, E) to be two-dimensional. Therefore, it can be stated that G is a Euclidean graph in which every sensor node has a coordinate (xi, yi)   2 in a two-dimensional space. The coordinate (xi, yi) represents the location of a node i in the given sensor field. The sensor node localization problem can now be stated as following: Let there be a multihop sensor network represented by a graph G = (V, E). The graph has a set of beacon nodes B with known positions given by (xb, yb) for all b  B. The localization problem requires to find the position set (xd, yd) of as many dumb nodes d D as possible. Finding the location of a node implies finding its latitude, longitude and altitude.

In many applications of industrial wireless sensor networks, sensor nodes need to determine their... more In many applications of industrial wireless sensor networks, sensor nodes need to determine their own geographic position coordinates so that the collected data can be ascribed to the location from where it was gathered. We propose a novel intelligent localization algorithm which uses variable range beacon signals generated by varying the transmission power of beacon nodes. The algorithm does not use any additional hardware resources for ranging and estimates position using only radio connectivity by passively listening to the beacon signals. The algorithm is distributed, so each sensor node determines its own position and communication overhead is avoided. As the beacon nodes do not always transmit at maximum power and no transmission power is used by unknown sensor nodes for localization, the proposed algorithm is energy efficient. It also provides control over localization granularity. Simulation results show that the algorithm provides good accuracy under varying radio conditions.

Free and open source software provides an alternative to commercial software. This presentation g... more Free and open source software provides an alternative to commercial software. This presentation gives an overview of the advantages of adopting free and open source software by public organizations in a country, specially Pakistan.

There is no denying the fact that with the widespread usage of computers and the Internet in our ... more There is no denying the fact that with the widespread usage of computers and the Internet in our daily lives, security of information and data has gained increased attention. Information stored in electronic form is more susceptible to being leaked to unauthorized individuals intentionally or without intent. One of the major reasons for this breach of security has been attributed to proprietary software whose source is available only to the company which made it. Thus you have no surety that the proprietary and pre-compiled software has no hole to help an individual break security of your computer or network. Philosophy of free and open source software as against this provides everyone an opportunity to view the source code for any possible vulnerabilities and compile and change it according to ones need. This paper discusses this philosophy in length with some examples and also some open source tools that help maintain computer and Internet security.

Revolution in the area of information technology has brought about changes in many spheres of lif... more Revolution in the area of information technology has brought about changes in many spheres of life. Today, information systems are being used in very sensitive areas such as defence and missile control systems, nuclear plants, etc. Not only has it changed how business is conducted, it has also brought about entirely new paradigms like that of information and cyber warfare. Similarly, one of the many impacts that it has made, is how wars are fought. For all what it has contributed, the information stored on digital devices and computers has become a precious resource and special measures are taken to guard it against attacks from malicious users. These special measures are needed by any enterprise be it a business firm, a commercial entity, a government agency or a military organization. However, requirements and specifications for information security and assurance for a military organization are essentially different from those of commercial or business applications. This paper hig...

This paper presents the verified methodology for wireless authentication system using infrared ba... more This paper presents the verified methodology for wireless authentication system using infrared barcode based scanner. An alternate approach of scanning a barcode using an infrared communication is implemented here, comprises of a card on which a barcode is printed is illuminated with an infrared beam. The reflections from the card are received by an infrared receiver and transmit them to a remote machine over wireless channel where the retrieve information is further processed and converted into the corresponding barcode digits which are further matched against the database stored in the server and the authenticity of the user is established. The system developed is cost-effective, efficient, provide double security and robust.

Not long ago, it was thought that only software applications and general purpose digital systems ... more Not long ago, it was thought that only software applications and general purpose digital systems i.e. computers were prone to various types of attacks against their security. The underlying hardware, hardware implementations of these software applications, embedded systems, and hardware devices were considered to be secure and out of reach of these attacks. However, during the previous few years, it has been demonstrated that novel attacks against the hardware and embedded systems can also be mounted. Not only viruses, but worms and Trojan horses have been developed for them, and they have also been demonstrated to be effective. Whereas a lot of research has already been done in the area of security of general purpose computers and software applications, hardware and embedded systems security is a relatively new and emerging area of research. This chapter provides details of various types of existing attacks against hardware devices and embedded systems, analyzes existing design methodologies for their vulnerability to new types of attacks, and along the way describes solutions and countermeasures against them for the design and development of secure systems.

A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing ... more A wireless sensor network comprises of small sensor nodes each of which consists of a processing device, small amount of memory, battery and radio transceiver for communication. The sensor nodes are autonomous and spatially distributed in an area of investigation. Certain applications and protocols of wireless sensor networks require that the sensor nodes should be aware of their position relative to the sensor network. For it to be significant and to be of value, the data such as temperature, humidity and pressure, gathered by sensor nodes must be ascribed to the relative position from where it was collected. For this to happen, the sensor nodes must be aware of their relative positions. Traditional location finding solutions, such as Global Positioning System, are not feasible for wireless sensor nodes due to multiple reasons. Therefore, new methods, techniques and algorithms need to be developed to solve the problem of location and position estimation of wireless sensor nodes. A number of algorithms and techniques based upon different characteristics and properties of sensor nodes have already been proposed for this purpose. This chapter discusses the basic principles and techniques used in the localization algorithms, categories of these algorithms and also takes a more closer look at a few of the representative localization schemes.

We propose a localization algorithm for wireless sensor networks, which is simple in design, does... more We propose a localization algorithm for wireless sensor networks, which is simple in design, does not involve significant overhead and yet provides acceptable position estimates of sensor nodes. The algorithm uses settled nodes as beacon nodes so as to increase the number of beacon nodes. The algorithm is range free and does not need any additional piece of hardware for ranging. It also does not involve any significant communication overhead for localization. The simulation and results show that good localization accuracy is achieved for outdoor environments.