CONCEPT: A Service Framework for Secure Ad-Hoc Environments

Despite its obvious potential in many contexts, ad-hoc networks are still mostly unknown, not popular and not a clear choice in the absence of any other network infrastructure. Two main reasons may be pointed out: the difficulty to configure a secure ad-hoc environment and the lack of ease to use services targeted to such environments. In this work we describe the design and implementation of a complete framework for service support based on three major components (1) a set of auto-configuration mechanisms suitable for ad-hoc environments (2) a transport layer protocol that allows the transfer of authenticated messages (3) an easy to use and web-based service framework. We believe that only those three components together make the framework powerful and effectively easy to use for the auto deployment of useful services in ad-hoc environments.
This work is partially funded by FEDER Funds through the Programa Operacional Fatores de Competitividade – COMPETE and by National Funds through the FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology) within project FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-022674