Single-Path Network Coding Authentication for Software-Defined Named Data Networking

Named Data Networking (NDN) represents a new communication paradigm, which shifts the Internet towards name-based routing. NDN relies on caching functionalities and local data storage, such as a content request could be satisfied by any node holding a copy of the content in its storage. Network coding, when combined with NDN, allows a data transfer session to use multiple sources for the content seamlessly to improve content delivery efficiency. In this paper, we address the data pollution issue which is inherent to network coding and we propose a single-path authenticated network coding mechanism for Named Data Networking, where a single route between the source to the destination is established. Packets are encoded, cached and signed among this path. First, we formulate our single-path-based optimal coding and homomorphic signature scheme as a mixed integer program (MIP) problem. We consider an optimistic model in which we focus mainly on maximizing defence level of the network. Furthermore, we show how to leverage Software Defined Networking to provide seamless implementation. Finally, we evaluate the efficiency of the proposed coding mechanism, which achieves better performance than conventional NDN with random coding especially in terms of transmission cost, processing overhead and security.