Energy cost evaluation of a secure 802.11 wireless transmission using NS-2

Mobile devices capable of transmitting and receiving data over an 802.11 network have become very common gadgets in our society. Most small mobile devices available in the market today come with integrated 802.11 radio. The extraordinary growth of this technology has also introduced several worries regarding the vulnerabilities that exist by transmitting data over the air. In order to minimize such problems, encryption algorithms were added as an option to be used with 802.11.; Unfortunately, the usage of encryption algorithms also causes a faster depletion of the energy resources available to a mobile device. Depending on the encryption algorithm implementation, a greater number of packets may be required in order to transmit the same amount of data that would be transmitted with less packets over a non-encrypted channel. The objective of this research is to analyze and evaluate the affects that the encryption algorithms used by wireless security protocols can have during data transmission over a wireless medium.