Limiting insider attacks on routers in an autonomous system running a link state routing protocol

Security of routing protocols is desirable in the ever-growing world of hackers and attackers. An attacker in control of routers compromise routers and cause substantial harm to the overall network. The compromised routers that show abnormal behavior should be detected and isolated to prevent further harm in the network. We study the security threats, namely, the insider attacks on routers running a link state protocol in an Autonomous System. We propose a novel approach (design) for eliminating insider attacks in a Link State Routing Protocol, like rogue routers inventing local information or reporting incorrect information, through development of a trust hierarchy. We also show that the approach has several advantages over the existing security schemes. We also propose how the concept and the design can be extended to protect against area-border routers that generate non-existent information into the attached areas in the link state advertisement.