security and privacy in molecular communication and networking: opportunities and challenges

198 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NANOBIOSCIENCE, VOL. 13, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2014

Security and Privacy in Molecular Communicationand Networking: Opportunities and ChallengesValeria Loscrí, César Marchal, Nathalie Mitton, Giancarlo Fortino, and Athanasios V. Vasilakos

Abstract—Molecular Communication (MC) is an emerging andpromising communication paradigm for several multi-disciplinarydomains like bio-medical, industry and military. Differently to thetraditional communication paradigm, the information is encodedon the molecules, that are then used as carriers of information.Novel approaches related to this new communication paradigmhave been proposed, mainly focusing on architectural aspects andcategorization of potential applications. So far, security and pri-vacy aspects related to the molecular communication systems havenot been investigated at all and represent an open question thatneed to be addressed. The main motivation of this paper lies onproviding some first insights about security and privacy aspects ofMC systems, by highlighting the open issues and challenges andabove all by outlining some specific directions of potential solu-tions. Existing cryptographicmethods and security approaches arenot suitable for MC systems since do not consider the pecific is-sues and challenges, that need ad-hoc solutions. We will discuss di-rections in terms of potential solutions by trying to highlight themain advantages and potential drawbacks for each direction con-sidered. We will try to answer to the main questions: 1) why thissolution can be exploited in the MC field to safeguard the systemand its reliability? 2) which are the main issues related to the spe-cific approach?

Index Terms—Artificial immune system, bio-cryptography,molecular communication, privacy, security.

I. INTRODUCTION

R ECENTLY, tremendous improvements in the field of nan-otechnology have enabled the realization of powerful and

functional nanodevices, inspired from the behavior of molec-ular structures. Nanodevices can be considered as independentlyoperating full-featured units capable of accomplishing tasks ascomputing, data storing, sensing and actuation. These devicesare also able to establish connections with the world and to

Manuscript received July 14, 2014; accepted August 07, 2014. Date of pub-lication August 18, 2014; date of current version September 23, 2014.V. Loscrí is with FUN Team at Inria Lille-Nord Europe. He is also with

the Computer Science, Modelling, Electronics and Systems EngineeringDepartment (DIMES), University of Calabria, Cosenza, Italy (e-mail:[email protected]).C. Marchal and N. Mitton are with FUN Team at Inria Lille-Nord Europe

(e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]).G. Fortino is with the Computer Science, Modelling, Electronics and Sys-

tems Engineering Department (DIMES), University of Calabria, Cosenza, Italy(e-mail: [email protected]).A. V. Vasilakos is with the Department of Computer and Telecommuni-

cations, Engineering, University of Western Macedonia, Macedonia, Greece(e-mail: [email protected]).Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online

at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TNB.2014.2349111

behave like living organisms. In [38], the authors express akind of parallelism between nanodevices and living cells. Theauthors also emphasize the necessity for the nanodevices tocommunicate.Among different communication paradigms, the most

promising is considered molecular communication (MC),where molecules are used to encode, transmit and receiveinformation [42] and it is an existing natural phenomena andnanonetworks can be implemented upon such naturally phe-nomena through the usage of appropriate tools. The most ofresearch regarding MC has been devoted to the foundations ofmolecular information theory by considering existing molec-ular communication systems, architectures and networkingtechniques and by proposing new ad-hoc approaches. Securityand privacy aspects related with this novel communicationparadigm have not yet been considered. Nano-devices arevulnerable to all sorts of attacks from a physical and wire-less viewpoint. Beyond the classical/traditional attacks, newtypes of attacks can be individuated, that are strictly relatedwith the specific applications of the MC systems. Just to givean example of a novel type of attack, it can be figured outthat a “desirable” feature for in-vivo applications could bethe “absorption” of the nanosensors after a certain period ofactivity. This is also important to avoid “responses” of theImmune System, by allowing external components to remaininside the body. A novel type of attack could consist in themanipulation of the “correct” time to activate the absorptionprocess, by accelerating or delaying it. In the former case,the effect is that the nanoparticles are not able to accomplishtheir task (i.e. sensing, drug delivery). In the case of a delayof the absorption time, undesired responses of the ImmuneSystem can be activated. In this paper, we will describe themain features of the MC paradigm by emphasizing the issuesand challenges related to. Existing security solutions cannot bedirectly applied in MC systems, because they do not capturethe features of this novel communication system and novel andad-hoc solutions need to be investigated. This paper aims togive some insights by outlining the main potentially effectivedirections to develop new authentication mechanisms, able toguarantee the data integrity and user privacy. In our opinion,bio-inspired approaches can play a very effective role againstvarious types of attacks, since the communication system underinvestigation is also bio-inspired and technological develop-ments are focusing on development of molecules as complexproteins or derived from strands of DNA. Nature give us manyexamples to face attacks against pathogen agents, virus, etc. byactivating the Immune System. Beyond Immune Systems, itis also possible to think about swarm of units (i.e. ants, bees,

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LOSCRÍ et al.: SECURITY AND PRIVACY IN MOLECULAR COMMUNICATION AND NETWORKING: OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES 199

etc.), that are able to cooperate in order to detect abnormality.Some recent research contributions consider the possibility tosee at the Immune System from a swarming viewpoint [2]. Thesynergic combination of these two bio-inspired approaches,can be very effective in the context of MC systems to managethe defense against attacks of external intruders. From thecharacterization of the fundamental features, we aim to givesome insights and to trace some directions in the security andprivacy definition of the MC systems. We will support somespecific potential solutions by trying to answer to fundamentalquestions, such as: why the approach considered is suitable tothe specific context we are examining? what are the potentialadvantages? what are the realization issues? In any case, apreliminary fundamental observation is related to the selectionof methods and techniques that are bio-inspired like MC is. Thepaper is structured as follows. Section II describes how biologysystems and computer science can be helpful to each otherand their interaction. Section III is devoted to the introductionof the molecular communication paradigm by emphasizingthe security and privacy issues. In Section IV we introduceand analyze potential solutions about security and privacymechanisms in the context of MC systems. Finally, Section Vconcludes this paper.

II. THE PARALLELISM OF BIOLOGY AND

COMPUTER NETWORKS

“The convergence of Computer Science and Biology willserve both disciplines, providing each with greater power andrelevance” [48]. In this work [48] about privacy and securityissues, Priami bases its foundations on the thinking biologicalsystems as complex networks. One fundamental observation isthat molecules of life do not function in isolation, but form com-plex networks that define a cell and biological networks are notrandom, but highly organized with an emerging global structureof network [44]. In this structure, basic components can be en-visaged, that are organized at a local level and contain repeatingpatterns. These local and simple “patterns” are buried in com-plexity and emerge as a result of specific constraints. Biologicalnetworks are scalable or “scale-free”, thanks to the presence offew nodes with many links and many nodes with few links, thatmake this kind of network as a hierarchical network. Of course,this type of system is robust to random attacks against nodes, butis more vulnerable with attacks against the hub. By observingbiological phenomena, we can notice that they present desir-able characteristics for digital computer and network applica-tions. Among all these features, we can remark them that can bestrictly related to security and privacy aspects, such as:• Cellular-Signaling Pathways: this characteristic regardsthe type of communication as occurs among cells, namelyat the molecular level. This type of communication isbased on very simple/elementary rules and the corrispec-tive emerging behavior is self-organized and coordinated;

• Homeostasis: is a kind of equilibrium state that biologicalsystems are able to keep, alsowhen external/environmentalconditions change;

• Division of Labor: the task sharing is the basic of theswarm networks concept, that inspired many digital com-puter and network applications. The key feature of theswarm network is that very simple individuals in a pop-ulation (i.e. ants, bees, etc.) are not able to perform com-plex tasks, but the accomplishment of very simple “duties”allows the realization of global common goal that can bevery complex;

• Immunity: is the capability of certain organisms to reactand block external harmful pathogens. An interestingaspect related to the natural Immune System, is that thetype of answer to an attack changes based on the priorknowledge of an external factor/pathogen; This type of“behavior” has been considered for implementing learningapproaches;

• Stigmergy-based communication: is the way some in-sects like bees, communicate to find the best paths to thefood sources. Stigmergy consists in the “modification” ofthe environment in such a way that the others can under-stand and react to. It is a kind of indirect communication;

• Synchronization: some biological systems are able to syn-chronize to each other through simple local observations.The singular behavior will be modified based on theselocal information and the whole system results globallysynchronized;

• Chemotaxis and Multicellular Embryogenesis: consistsin the capability of identical embryogenic cells to formdifferent structures of the body through a differentiationprocess. Thanks to this “feature”, the organism is able torepair wounds, cells are also able to regenerate themselves.Similar characteristics have been considered in reactiverouting algorithms when failures occur along a path;

• Cell Potency: is the differentiation capability of the cells.Several kinds of “potency” can be individuated: a) totipo-tency; b) pluripotency; c) multipotency; d) oligopotency;e) unipotency. This kind of feature is something really in-teresting from a network application point of view. It al-lows the re-definition of the role of a device in a differentcontext (i.e. a smartphone that in specific condition can ac-complish the role of gateway).

Recent research efforts focus on the comprehension of themechanisms behind these biological phenomena, in order to beable to implement similar principles in algorithms that will beapplied in digital computers and network applications. Somevery recent works propose a taxonomy of the Biologically-In-spired Algorithms (BIAs) [45]. BIAs are structured based on:1) biological source; 2) mathematical model; 3) major applica-tions; 4) advantages corresponding to “classic” approaches; 5)limitations and border conditions; 6) potential applications.In the Fig. 1, we summarize the Bio-Inspired Approaches that

we envisage as the most suitable for security and privacy ap-plications, above all in the context of molecular communicationsystems. The selection of these approaches was realized by con-sidering the working principles of the approaches in the biolog-ical systems.Of course, this taxonomy does not claim to be exhaustive, but

includes the main macro-categories that we will detail later inthis paper.


Fig. 1. A taxonomy of biologically inspired algorithms.

III. MOLECULAR COMMUNICATION SECURITY:ISSUES AND CHALLENGES

Molecular Communication (MC) is a novel and differentcommunication paradigm, envisaged as the most practical wayin which nano-robots can communicate with each other [38]. Itconsiders encoded molecules as information carriers instead ofelectromagnetic waves as in electro-magnetic communicationsor light waves in optical communications or acoustic waves inacoustic communications. Also the information encoding canbe different based on how the information is encoded: moleculepresence (i.e. the presence or absence of a selected type of mol-ecule is used to digitally encode messages) [52], concentration[49], configuration [38], [51], sequence of macro-molecules[50], etc. In molecular communications, complex proteins areused as information carriers and a digital symbol transforma-tion is not necessarily required. Molecular communication canbe classified as long-range communication using pheromones,medium-range communication, by using active transport withmolecular motors in fluidic medium, short-range communica-tion that implies passive transport using calcium signaling orby diffusion. In the framework of nanonetworks, short-rangeis understood as the communication process that takes placein the range from nm to few mm, whereas long-range referto the communication process in which the transmitter andreceiver nanomachines range from mm up to km [38]. In thetraditional communication systems, the longer is the distancethe information has to “travel” the bigger is the vulnerability ofthe system along the path. In the context of MC systems, webelieve that the distance does not condition the level of security,since the “manipulation” of the nanodevices from malicioususers is performed externally. This means that, whether a nodehas been manipulated to misbehave, also the short-range com-munication will be affected to. A very interesting descriptionof a molecular communication architecture is done in [37],where the transmitter is represented by a sender bio-nanoma-chine that releases the information molecules, the receiver isthe bio-machine that detects information molecules, moleculesrepresent the information to be transmitted and the environmentwhere the molecules propagate represents in some way thepropagation channel. The authors also explain how the system

can become more complicated, by distinguishing differenttypes of molecules that accomplish different actions, like:“transport molecules”, that move the information molecules,“guide molecules” to drive the movement of the transportmolecules, etc. The authors also show every single phaseof the molecular communication by describing the encodingphase, the sending phase, the propagation phase, the receivingphase and the decoding phase. In [3], a layered architectureof molecular communication by outlining the challenges ofeach layer, is presented. This type of approach is very usefulto create a structured architecture of this novel communicationparadigm allowing the individuation of the issues like in atraditional communication system. The necessity to determinea kind of parallelism with a traditional communication networkis also witnessed by the proposal of a transport protocol in [39],where the authors propose a connection oriented mechanism.An example of practical demonstration of molecular communi-cation system is given in [40], where the authors implement amacroscopic molecular communication system for transmittinga brief text message by the means of chemical signals.Even if many improvements in the field of nano-technologies

and molecular communication have been done, the security andprivacy aspects of nano-communication represent something to-tally new that has not yet been investigated. A preliminary workabout nano-communication security is presented in [14], but tothe best of our knowledge this is the first work that investigatesissues and challenges of molecular communication and seeks tooutline potential solution directions.As envisaged in several papers, potential applications of

molecular communication can range from biomedical, envi-ronmental and manufacturing areas. Given the criticality ofthe envisioned application domains and the fact that bio-nanorobots can be embedded in our body, in the environment, inthe food, attacks of this type of communication systems couldhave disastrous consequences and then the level of criticality ishigher than in traditional Internet applications.To the follow, wewill try to face themajor challenges for each

layer of themolecular network. This kind of approach allows thedevelopment of a detailed analysis.

A. A Layered Approach for Security and Privacy Issues

A first attempt of “structure” as layered architecture of thisnovel communication system is presented in [3] and we willrefer to it to the follow.1) Physical Layer: As in in [3], we separate the Physical

Layer into two sub-layers: 1) Bio-machine sublayer and 2) Sig-naling sublayer.• Bio-machine sublayer: the communication among bio-nanomachines occurs through a mechanism of inputs andoutputs and by modifying the corresponding states of ananomachine, based on all the inputs considered at a cer-tain time . Typical attacks at this level are Jamming andTampering as in traditional wireless systems.Usually, thedefense against jamming involves spread spectrum or fre-quency hopping mechanisms, that cannot be consideredin the context of molecular communication. Specific andad-hoc mechanisms need to be designed and implemented.


The tampering attacks can be “realized” through the ma-nipulation of the molecules. This could be easily donewhen the encoding of the messages is performed through aspecific configuration. This specific type of attacks is verydifficult to be detected in the context we are consideringand the side effects could be very serious.

• Signaling sub-layer: some of the main functionalities re-quired at this level as envisaged in [3], whether applied ina malicious and inappropriate way, can be “exploited” byan attacker to generate a malfunctioning system. Firstly,the “replication” functionality could be manipulated to“flood” the environment with particles. Totally opposite isthe misuse of the “suppressing/killing” functionality, thatcould be used in a bad way to kill the molecules beforethey accomplish the specific task assigned.

2) Molecular Link Layer: Among the main functionalitiesmanaged at this layer, there are the media access control and theflow control. In the case of MC, the medium is aqueous/fluidic.Typical attacks that can be envisaged at this level are “collision”and “unfairness”. In traditional communication systems, colli-sion attacks are mitigated through error-correcting techniquesat link layer. Concerning the specific context of MC systems,we individuate two kinds of problems related to this type of at-tack: 1) error-correcting mechanisms are really difficult to beimplemented and this type of technique is also strictly relatedto the characteristics and functionalities of the physical layer.Whether a bio-nanomachine at the physical layer releases indi-vidual molecules in the environment, it could be very compli-cated to detect a collision and then to elaborate an error-cor-recting approach. On the other hand, if the bio-nanomachineat the physical layer supports vesicle-based molecules trans-mission and reception, this is like a dedicated physical channeland the “attacker” should be aware about how to manipulate it.Through the vesicle-based molecules there is a kind of compart-mentalization of the information molecules from the propaga-tion environment, that is able to protect information moleculesfrom molecular deformation and cleavage, that can be mali-ciously caused by enzymatic attacks or by modifying the pH ofthe outer aqueous phase. The bio-nanomachines that at the phys-ical sub-layer release individual molecules are not protectedfrom this type of attack and, if the information is based on thetype of information transported, this type of attack is translatedin a systemmalfunction. On the other hand, collision and unfair-ness can be easily performed by attackers when the transporta-tion of the information is realized by the means of diffusion; Inthis case the different concentration levels (gradient) is the ac-tivation trigger of the communication system.3) Molecular Network Layer: In [3], the authors introduce

the concept of Molecular Network Layer, by defining the enti-ties involved and describing the main functionalities, namelyhow the molecular network formation can be realized andhow the routing can be implemented, by also considering thepossibility to realize an opportunistic routing. An interestingfunctionality that they consider is “Molecular Packet LossHandling”, where loss of packets is related to the exhaustionof the molecular packet storage. In our opinion, this type ofattacks can be easily realized and represents, for sure, an issuein terms of security. On the other hand, traditional attacks

TABLE ITYPE OF ATTACK FOR EACH LAYER

realized in classical wireless network systems, are not an issuein this case, since are too complicated to be realized. Let usconsider just an example: a Sybil attack, where the “severity”of the attack is related to how cheaply and easily identities canbe generated. In the context of molecular communication, isneither easy nor cheap the “replication” of identities.4) Molecular Transport Layer: This layer is devoted to pro-

vide reliability and session control. Only a source and a des-tination are directly involved and there are not considered en-tities in between. We can envisage some security issues thatare also common in the classical communication systems, suchas flooding and a kind of desynchronization. The flooding willincrease the congestion, namely too many molecular transportdata units are transmitted into a molecular communication pipe.The limitation of the number of “connections” can prevent theflooding attack, but this also prevents legitimate sources fromconnecting to the victim destinations. “Desynchronization” at-tack involves the handling of the sequence of molecular trans-port data units. Sequence handling can be performed in molec-ular communication as explained in [43]. This type of controlcan be very important for applications such as tissue engineeringand a “desynchronization” attack could imply very catastrophicconsequences.5) Molecular Application Layer: Concerning this layer, it

is difficult to “derive” a descriptive general model. In terms ofsecurity and privacy issues, the applications of a MC systemshould be “protected” against the various types of attacks weenvisaged at each level, if effective mechanism to preserve theintegrity and reliability of the system are developed for everylayer.In the Table I we summarize the types of attack associated to

every specific layer.

IV. NEW DIRECTIONS FOR MOLECULAR COMMUNICATIONSECURITY AND PRIVACY

Existing mechanisms to make traditional wireless communi-cation systems trust and secure cannot be applied for many dif-ferent reasons to MC based systems. Our goal, with this paperis to provide some first insights into MC paradigm and try tohighlight the main issues.In this section we aim to “sketch out” possible solutions and

specific directions for MC security.Bio-inspired approaches can play a primary role and could

open new research directions in terms of security for MC para-digm since MC is itself bio-inspired and there are in nature sev-eral defense mechanisms against various type of attacks that arereally effective. For these reasons, we will consider Immune Ar-tificial Systems, Swarm molecular approaches and Bio-chem-ical Cryptography.


A. Artificial Immune Systems (AIS)

A canonical definition of Artificial Immune System (AIS)does not exist, but Castro and Timmis [1] tried to describe thedomain as follows: “adaptive systems, inspired by theoreticalimmunology and observed immune functions, principles andmodels, which are applied to problem solving”. As outlined in[2] it is a bit general definition. In fact, there are not specifiedparticular properties, but in general an Immune System (IS), thatis natural or artificial, has to present the following appealingfeatures:• Robustness, that is more desirable in an highly dynamicand stochastic environment such as MC systems;

• Reinforcement Learning, namely the capability to learnand to change its proper state;

• Memory, that is the capability to make the current statedependable not only on the current inputs, but also froma certain number of past states;

• Distributed, since in an IS there is not a central controllerthat coordinate all the actions;

• Adaptive, that is related with the Reinforcement Learningcapability. An IS should be able to change and to “adapt”by reacting to new external stimuli;

• Recognition (Anomaly Detection, Noise Tolerance, etc.)• Dynamically changing coverage,

In [3] authors provide an in-depth architectural view of MCby considering it among biological nanomachines. Among themain functionalities the authors individuate there is the replica-tion, namely the capability to make a copy of themselves or pre-senting the same functionalities. This capability would mimicsthe cellular division and will be a very interesting functionalityfor an AIS. They also envisage the possibility to use biolog-ical molecules for implementing a memory in a bio-machine.Memory property will be also really important for AIS and is acharacteristic that real IS exhibit.The main three research fields related with the AIS are: 1) Im-

mune Networks; 2) Clonal Selection; and 3) Negative Selection.1) Immune Networks: Immune Network Theory is funda-

mental for the development of artificial immune networks andalso for machine-learning approaches. The father of the ImmuneNetwork or Artificial Immune Network theory is Niels Jerne,that firstly postulated it in [4]. The basics of this theory arethat each of the clones are strongly interconnected and have notto be regarded as a separate entity. In practice, for every anti-body, there is a portion of their receptors that can be recognizedby other antibody. From this interconnection derives the con-cept of Immune Network. The B-cells stimulate and suppresseach other in a way that a global stabilization of the network isachieved. The connection of two B-cells depends on the affinitybetween them that has to exceed a certain threshold. Also thestrength of the connection is directly proportional to the affinityshared between two B-cells. In the Jerne’s theory it was alsovery important the concept of dualism, as that the number twoplay an important role. In order to understand this “feeling” ofJerne it is sufficient to think about the two main cells involved inthe human immune system, namely T-Cells and B-Cells. Jerneassumed that here were two main “types” of interactions, thatare stimulation and suppression. Recently, a third interaction has

Fig. 2. Representation of the basic response in a biological IS.[1].

been recognized, namely the “suppressive” interaction. Also thetwo main classes of cells became three. In Fig. 2 we can see arepresentation of the IS. The network approach of the IS wasalso considered by Richter [5] that went a step ahead, by theo-retically demonstrating that the connections can have functionalconsequences. This means that the cells of the IS are function-ally connected through components with big diversity.Each cell is connected to a subset of the rest thanks to the

interconnection. This means that this system shows importantproperties like memory, no centralized control and little, if any,hierarchical organization, robustness to failure and above all thenetwork of cells as a whole and not as constituted by individualcells. In [6] the idiotypic network theory is shown to be an ab-surd, but in any case it has been a very revolutionary conceptthat allowed to make many steps ahead in the theory of AIS.

a) Why immune networks for MC security: The immunenetwork approach can provide and takes into account emergentproperties such as tolerance, learning capability, memory. Theactivity of the units with the constraints from the surroundingof the system, produces emerging global patterns over the en-tire network. In [7] the authors outline a very important fea-ture of IS, that is adaptability. It is outlined as any new elementin shape space (defined as a quantitative way to describe theaffinity degree between cells and antigens), also with no evolu-tionary history, can interact with a functioning IS. This featuresis regarded as a “completeness” property, that is independentfrom learning capability and it the result of the way the “molec-ular identity is established while at the same time allowed tochange”. This is called by the authors in [7] as the metady-namics property of the IS and goes beyond the network dy-namics. Metadynamics consists of production and recruitmentof new molecules that can interact with the IS and for that theemerging property from the metadynamics is defined as com-pleteness. This way the system will be adaptive against a widerange of new and unknown invaders. In [3], authors pose a veryfundamental question about “How do we design bio-nanoma-chines, taking an advantage of useful features of biomaterials?”.Based on the reasoning and the considerations related with se-curity issues of this new communication paradigm, we reallybelieve that the greater is the capability to exploit the featuresof biological entities, the greater will be the advantages relatedwith the security mechanisms that can be developed. By fol-lowing this approach, we “pursue the road” that a bio-inspiredmechanism could be very effective against new types of attacks


that could have very catastrophic consequences, due to the spe-cific potential application of nanonetworks.

b) Immune networks for MC security: Open issues: So far,we have highlighted the potential advantages in terms of secu-rity for the MC paradigm by adopting the Immune Networksapproach. In literature there have been presented Artificial Im-mune Networks models for several applications and also for se-curity and privacy purpose as in [8]. As highlighted in [3], thepossibility to design bio-nanomachine, “synthetic” moleculesthat inherit the same features like anti-virus agents, by equip-ping them with the capability to mutate or by putting onto thesurface the specific receptors by mimicking the Immune Net-work, would be a very effective solution. In our opinion, it is avery promising research direction but we envisage three mainissues:• The need of specific laboratories, where this kind of agentscan be synthesized;

• Requirement of a high-level inter-disciplinary effort;• Make the agents workable in a specific environment butavoiding any type of interference with other molecules orcells present in the environment.

The first challenge is more or less common to all the bio-in-spired solutions we are analyzing. The main problem is that thelaboratory tools to work at nano size level are at the momentreally expensive. Since research effort is devoted to the studyof novel and promising material (i.e. graphene), we are con-fident that the cost will decrease with the progress in the re-search and in a few years it will be a reality to have laborato-ries where is possible to synthesize artificial molecules with thefeatures of anti-viruses agents. In the meantime, it is possibleto work by proposing models of Artificial Immune Networksand by testing their effectiveness through simulation tools. Aninter-disciplinary effort is really desirable to make this kind ofsecurity approach effective.We know that Human IS works verywell and is the most of the times really effective against externalpathogens, but it is a very complex system and important fea-tures and emerging global properties need to be extrapolatedin order to design a security mechanism that is able to work atthe level of a Human IS. The last challenge is common to allthe communication systems, where the interference has to beavoided and specific solutions are considered to make the in-terference and external disturbing noises as neglectable as pos-sible. In this context, this matter can be very “urgent” if we con-sider in-body applications.2) Clonal Selection: [9]: The Clonal Selection Theory

(CST) was postulated by David Talmadge [10] and F. M.Burnet [11] in 1957 and is part of the primary immune re-sponse, that is provoked when an antigen attacks the body. TheCST is used to explain the basic response of the adaptive IS toan antigen. A chemical trigger is activated when the lympho-cyte will connect to the antigen, and this implies the cloningprocess, by replicating copies of the lymphocyte against thespecific antigen. From this process two different types of cellscan be distinguished that are effector cells (short lived cells)and memory cells that are inactive in the premiere immune re-sponse and will play an important role for a secondary immuneresponse. In the Clonal Selection process there are two mainaspects that is worth to be noticed: replication and memory.

The latter is what makes a person immune. One of the keyconcept that Clonal Selection involves, is the self-recognition,that makes the IS introspective, since mutual recognition of theproper own similar is recognized as important as the recogni-tion of the foreign “objects”.

a) Why clonal selection for MC security: The Clonal Se-lection theory has been used as inspiration for the developmentof AISs. In [12], the authors propose a detection system ofmisbehaving nodes in Mobile Ad-hoc NETworks (MANETs),based on the Clonal Selection concept. In their context a nodemisbehaves whether it disobeys routing protocols, by droppingrouting control packets. In order to be able to individuateand then detect misbehavior, the authors proposed to collectevents related to sent and received packets and labelled themand collected them in a sequence to form the antigens. Oncea detector finds a “match”, the mechanism enters a ClonalSelection Algorithm. Also in the case of Clonal Selectionemerging properties, like learning and memory capability,make the mechanism very effective against attacks. The work[12] shows as the idea behind the general concepts of CS canbe effectively applied also in computer science. When weconsider MC, we go a step ahead, since we are thinking aboutthe capability to exchange information as in complex systemslike the human body. Once again, the possibility to exploitbio-materiels to design bio-nanomachine could give us thepossibility to implement mechanism like the Clonal Selectionas “defense” against external attacks.

b) Clonal selection for MC security: open issues: The syn-thesizing cells/molecules and the manipulations of these reallysize-constrained objects implies the necessity of very accuratelaboratories and an high level multi-disciplinarity. Another po-tential issue can be envisaged whether the replication capabilitywill be exploited, since it could be potentially used as a spe-cific type of attack. Based on the specific application domain,the level of criticality could be very high. This is a commonfactor for the application domains of the MC that could be alsoin the body. Considering this latter type of application domain,not only the constituents of a bio-nanomachines have to be “tol-erated” by the IS, but the reaction against an external attack (bymimicking the IS) has to be realized in a way that it does notinterfere with the normal IS activities. On the other hand, thehuman being IS is already able to prevent this kind of attack byimplementing what is known as Negative Selection.3) Negative Selection: [15]: Lymphocytes could react not

only against antigen but also against “things” belonging to thehosts’s cells. This kind of reaction is known as auto-immunityand can be very dangerous for the host organism. In order to facethis kind of issues, the human body “employs” a mechanismcalled Negative Selection, that is a process involving T-cells andthat occurs within the thymus. Through a complex mechanismT-cells undergo a censoring process in the thymus and T-cellsthat recognize self proteins are destroyed and are not allowed toleave the thymus. This way, the human body only keeps T-cellsable to recognize foreign antigens and are not self-reactive.

a) Why negative selection for MC security: The processbehind the Negative Selection has inspired a large amount ofAIS work such as [16]. In this work, the authors highlight one ofthe key factors for protecting computer system, that is to acquire


TABLE IIDNA CRYPTOGRAPHIC TECHNIQUES

the capability to distinguish among self and nonself. Of course,the authors propose an algorithm inspired by the Negative Se-lection mechanism, with a recognition mechanism in a binaryIS, that is highly simplified in respect of the complex chem-istry involved in a real chemistry of antibody/antigen recogni-tion mechanism.

b) Negative selection for MC security: open issues: Theinherent capability of the Negative Selection for distinguishingself from other, could be effectively considered as a basic for se-curity and privacy in MC based systems. Maybe, the main chal-lenge is to build a defense mechanism that is able to not inter-fere with the rest of the context (i.e. the other cells inside a body,the other molecules inside a fluidic medium, etc.). In oppositionwith the Immune Networks and the Clonal Selection, once sci-entists will be able to work at molecular level, this method couldpresent less difficulties. We envisage in this specific mechanismof the IS an effective response to external attacks against the im-munity of the host.4) Danger Theory[46]: The key factor of the Danger Theory

is that the IS reacts against to danger and not to non-self. It points

out that there must be discrimination that occurs for somethingthat is beyond the self-non-self distinction. This theory pro-voked criticism and enthusiasm. It was proposed as rival of theself-non-self theory, since is based on the main concept that theimmune responses are triggered by “alarm signal” released bythe cells of the body. In practice, this is in contradiction withthe concept that the immune response is “provocated” by thepresence of “non-self”. This theory come out of the observationthat there is no need to attack all is foreign. The measure of thedanger of the cells indicated by distress signals that are sent outwhen cells die.

a) Why danger theory for MC security: The basic prin-ciple of this theory is perfectly in accordance with the de-fense mechanisms that have to be activated in terms of secu-rity and privacy. When malicious behavior is detected in thenetwork raise a danger signal and react as appropriate. Thistype of theory already inspired recent applications in com-puter security as proposed in [47], where a multi-agent-basedIntrusion Detection System inspired by the danger theory isproposed.


b) Danger theory for MC security: Open issues: Asalready outlined, the basic and key principles of the DangerTheory are really suitable for detection of intruder and thencould be exploited for MC systems. The main difficulties thatneed to be considered are about the semantic meaning of whathas to be considered potentially dangerous and what is not.An important application of the MC paradigm is for in-vivoapplication and the paradigm in-self implies the manipulation atthe molecular level of the information units or the introductionof external nanomachines. A defense mechanism should bereally sophisticated to detect the “real” danger signals.

B. Swarm Molecular Security Approaches

The concept of swarm is usually associated with groupingof “units” that collectively exhibit complex behaviors and ac-complish complex global tasks that are not able to accomplishindividually. Swarm intelligence is “The emergent collective in-telligence of groups of simple agents” [32]. Swarm researchersare really motivated because a swarm of insects with very lim-ited capabilities still finishes very complex tasks. Recently, thenetworks security systems started to apply swarming naturalmodels for the intrusion detection purpose. The goal can beto individuate and tracing the attack source, or another impor-tant objective could be the distinction between a normal andabnormal behavior, etc. [31]. Swarm based security systemspresent a very high potentiality, since it is possible to realizesystems that are light in weight and simple to put in practiceand simultaneously they present an high effectiveness degreein terms of security since they are very adaptive, self-config-urable and robust. A very interesting survey about the applica-tion of Swarm Intelligence in Network Security is presented in[31]. The authors highlight the reasons why network securitycan be “treated” with Swarm Intelligence methods. One of thepioneer researchs about Swarm Intelligence in Network Secu-rity is given in the article entitled “Ants vs worms” [33], whereit is very well explained how the nature can help defend againstattacks and intruders. The idea to consider Swarm Intelligencefor Cooperation of Bio-nano robots has been presented in 2006in [34]. The bio-nano robots are very limited in terms of in-dividual intelligence and capabilities, but the collection of thenano robots can be very effective for the solution of very com-plex tasks. In [34] nano-robots are able to self-coordinate by themeans of signaling molecules, that is quorum sensing [35]. An-other more recent contribution in terms of swarm nanorobotshas been presented in [36], where the authors show the effec-tiveness of a swarm cooperation by communication throughacoustic signaling. These works show the feasibility and the ef-fectiveness to apply the Swarm Intelligence concept to elemen-tary and nano-sized units even if they do not focus on securityand privacy aspects. A very interesting and different perspec-tive of the AIS is presented in [2], where the IS is consideredfrom the perspective of a swarm system and more specifically,the authors investigate the relationship between the Swarm In-telligence and AIS fields. This novel perspective is very inter-esting, since the authors highlight the similarities of the twobio-inspired approaches, but they go beyond by showing thatthe two approaches can be used in a complementary fashion tosolve complex engineering problems. Swarm approaches seem

to be a suitable solution for security and privacy managementfor MC systems, but there are some challenges that it is worthto be mentioned. Firstly, the cooperation among the units toreach self-organizing purpose and to coordinate for a commonobjective is something not-trivial. The communication amongthe nano-units has to be very precise and the nodes have to be“educated” about the “instructions” they have to execute.

C. Bio-Chemical Cryptography

The term Bio-chemical Cryptography has been introduced byDressler and Kargl in [14] as “a primitive that may be used forefficiently securing biologically based information channels”.In this section, we will try to highlight the progress in the bi-ological and chemical context, in order to understand the fea-sibility of security and privacy mechanisms based on this con-cept. Since Richard Feynman’s talk (in 1959) about a visionarypossibility of building really size-reduced computer (at nanosizelevel), some progress in the “miniaturization” of the devices hasbeen realized, but this goal appears yet far to be reached. Andthen, the possibility of computing directly with molecules hasstarted to be considered. One of the first results about molec-ular computation regards the usage of tools of molecules tosolve an instance of the directed Hamiltonian path problem [17].Molecules of DNA were used to encode a small graph, andthe computation were performed by means of enzymes. Thisfirst pioneering experiment can be considered a milestone inthe context of molecular computation, since shows the feasi-bility to make computing at the molecular level. DNA com-puting requires a very high level of multi-disciplinarity by in-volving competencies of biologists, mathematics, computer sci-ence, etc. and is able to provide a huge level of parallelism, withan extraordinary information density inbuilt in DNA molecules[19].Moreover, it can be envisaged an extraordinary energy effi-ciency in the DNAmolecules. Twenty years later we are consid-ering MC and why not considering the possibility to use primersas encryption methods? On the other hand if DNA computingcan be used to break codes, then the machinery of life can beexploited to encrypt data too. To make that it is necessary to an-alyze both adavtages and limitations of DNA-inspired securityapproaches.1) Advantages of DNA-Inspired Cryptography Techniques:

One of the most important advantages of DNA-cryptographytechniques is its secure nature. Since it is used for encryption,the signature authorization is not necessary. Another big advan-tage is in the density of information. By considering that onegram of DNA contains 1021 DNA bases that is equal to 108tera-bytes of data [53], this corresponds to a very exceptionaldensity of information. Moreover, it can be envisaged a mas-sively parallel fashion, since there are many enzymes that areable to read and process DNA according to the nature’s design,and the manipulation occurs at a molecular level. DNA has theinherent capability to perform operations like, cutting, pasting,copying, etc. The enzymes work on one DNA at a time and notin a serial fashion. In the Table II we summarize different con-tributions in terms of DNA cryptographic methods, by givinga brief description of each proposed technique. The table is in-tended not only to summarize the DNA-based algorithms but


also to show their feasibility in terms of security and privacyapproaches.Performance of cryptographic techniques based on DNA

present a very high potential for several security applicationsnetwork and we really believe that this enormous potentialitycan be effectively exploited also for MC. In the Table II wehave shown that certain DNA techniques can resist exhaustiveattacks, differential attacks and statistical attacks.2) Drawbacks of DNA-Inspired Cryptography Techniques:

It is worth to notice that despite of their great potential, DNAcryptography also presents few drawbacks, such as: 1) Lackof theoretical basis; and 2) Difficult to realize and very expen-sive to apply. The reasons we dedicated so much space to thistype of approach in this work is that we believe that both of thedisadvantages considered can be overcome. It is true that theprocesses take place at the molecular level have not been real-ized to its entirety outside an ultra-modern laboratory, but is alsotrue that MC finds its basic in the manipulation at a molecularlevel. Research is making advancements in terms of theoreticalfoundations related to DNA and the technological advances willallow to make DNA approaches feasible in terms of costs andlow complexity.

V. CONCLUSIONS

We have provided a comprehensive overview of the MCsystems from the security and privacy viewpoint that is avery multi-disciplinary context, that involves researchers andscientists from very different disciplines: engineers, biologists,medicine, etc. The level of criticism of the potential applica-tions of nano-communication systems in general and even morethose of molecular communication system, makes the securityand privacy topic in this context very urgent. In this work wetried to outline the main issues and challenges related to thesecurity and privacy aspects of molecular communication sys-tems. We individuated in bio-inspired approaches some validdirections to pursue the defense mechanism goals. We triedto present these techniques in a very critical way by showingthe potentiality in terms of defense and their suitability forthe specific context, but also we outlined the main issues andchallenges. With the analysis we can conclude that the securityand privacy mechanisms for molecular communication net-works, require a very high level of interaction among variousdiscipline to be realized effectively.

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Valeria Loscrí is a permanent researcher of the FUNTeam in Inria since October 2013. She got her Masterdegree in Computer Science and Ph.D. in SystemsEngineering and Computer Science in 2003 and 2007respectively, both at University of Calabria (Italy). In2006 she visited for 6 months Rice University underthe supervision of Prof. Knightly, where she workedon the MAC layer of wireless mesh networks. Sheauthored more than 60 publications in journal, con-ferences, workshops and book chapters. She is in-volved in several programs and organization commit-

tees such as SWANSITY 2014,WiMob 2014, IDCS 2014. Her research interestsfocus on performance evaluation, self-organizing systems, robotics networks,nanocommunications.

César Marchal got his Master degree in ComputerScience in 2013 at Université de Technologie deCompiègne, France. Currently, he is a Ph.D. studentat Inria Lille—Nord Europe in the FUN Team. Hisresearch interests focus on security and privacy inwireless networks.

Nathalie Mitton received the MSc and Ph.D. de-grees in Computer Science from INSALyon in 2003and 2006 respectively. She received her Habilitationdiriger des recherches(HDR) in 2011 from UniversitLille 1. She is currently an Inria full researchersince 2006 and from 2012, she is the scientifichead of the Inria FUN team. Her research interestsare focused on self-organization, energy efficientrouting for wireless sensor networks as well as RFIDmiddlewares. She is involved in the set up of FIT(http://fit-equipex.fr/) and in several program and

organization committees such as AdHocNets 2014, HPCC 2014, WiMob 2013,IST-AWSN 2012, iThings 2012, etc.

Giancarlo Fortino is currently Associate Professorof Computer Engineering (since 2006) at DIMESdep. of the Unical (Italy). He has a Ph.D. and Laurea(MSc+BSc) degree in Computer Engineering fromUnical. He holds the Italian Scientific NationalHabilitation for Full Professorship and is GuestProfessor at the Wuhan University of Technology,China. He has been also Visiting Researcher andProfessor at the International Computer ScienceInstitute (Berkeley, USA) and at the QueenslandUniversity of Technology (Australia), respectively.

His main research interests include agent-based computing, wireless sensornetworks, pervasive and cloud computing, multimedia networks and Internet ofThings technology. He authored over 200 publications in journals, conferencesand books. He is the founding editor of the Springer Book Series on “Internetof Things: Technology, Communications and Computing”, and currently servesin the editorial board of IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON AFFECTIVE COMPUTING,Journal of Networks and Computer Applications, Engineering Applicationsof Artificial Intelligence, Information Fusion. He is co-founder and CEO ofSenSysCal S.r.l., a spin-off of Unical, developing innovative sensor-basedsystems for e-health and domotics. He is IEEE Senior member.

Athanasios V. Vasilakos is currently Professor atUniversity of Western Macedonia, Greece. He hasauthored or co-authored over 200 technical papers inmajor international journals and conferences. He isauthor/coauthor of five books and 20 book chaptersin the areas of communications. Prof. Vasilakoshas served as General Chair, TPC Chair for manyconferences. He has served as an Editor or/andGuest Editor for many technical journals, such asthe IEEE TIFS, IEEE TCC, IEEE TRANSACTIONSON NETWORK AND SERVICES MANAGEMENT, IEEE

TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS, IEEE TRANSACTIONSON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN BIOMEDICINE, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ONCOMPUTERS, ACM trans. on autonomous and adaptive systems, IEEE JSACspecial issues of May 2009, Jan. 2011, March 2011, IEEE Commag, ACMWINET, ACM MONET. He is founding Editor-in-Chief of the IJAACS andthe IJART. He is General Chair of the Council of Computing of the EuropeanAlliances for Innovation.

security and privacy in molecular communication and networking: opportunities and challenges

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