Dr R Kharel
No more applications being accepted
Competition Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)
About the Project
Our Centre for Advanced Computational Science is recruiting new students for a number of PhD projects across a range of topics to start in April 2020. Funding is being considered for these projects, and will be competitively assessed and awarded on a case-by-case basis determined by the strength of your application.
Future vehicles are no longer stand-alone transportation medium due to the increasing advancements on Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I). The connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) are aimed towards sustainable developments in transportation by enhancing safety and efficiency. The sensor enabled intelligent automation of vehicle’s mechanical operations definitely enhance safety in on-road travelling whereas, cooperative traffic information sharing in vehicular network improves travelling efficiency.
However, safety and efficiency-oriented sustainability in transportation via Internet of connected Vehicles (IoV) comes with greater risk of virtual vehicle hijacking. Ranging from unauthorized accessing of wheels, disabling brakes, locking doors, engine disruption to path forging, location and identity manipulation, denial of traffic service, tracking, are the few examples virtual vehicle hijacking. We have witnessed security threat in computer networks in terms of unauthorized system and application hijacking in greater scale targeting particular individual, specific organization or even entire systems of a country. So, there is also necessity to prepare for a virtual vehicle hijacking in IoV, concerning the reliable, ubiquitous and seamless IoV communication.
Due to the increasing automation on vehicles enabling via sensor and vehicular communication advancements, operational security in connected vehicles has emerged as a potential technical issue in vehicular network environments.
Some of the research questions for securing IoV are as follows:
How to provide a solution for a hijacking scenario, from autonomous connected vehicle to disconnected mechanical machine?
How to ensure the integrity of accumulated traffic information from neighbouring vehicles?
How to avoid identity theft on vehicular communication system and GPS tracking?
What are the implications in implementing cryptographic security on vehicular networks considering ad-hoc networking scenario?
What are the non-cryptographic security mechanisms suitable for ad-hoc vehicular network environments?
The current challenges on IoV is due to the difficulties in technical migration of protocols, techniques and standards from static wireless communication to highly mobile vehicular communication environments. In this project, newer modelling and practice for securing connected vehicles will be explored.
Specific Requirements of the Project
An honours degree at first class level (or preferably MSc) in Computer Science discipline
Knowledge and experience of cyber security
Excellent programming knowledge and problem-solving approaches
Capability to work independently and as part of a team
Excellent written and oral communication, and organisational skills.
A real passion and commitment for research.
Project Aims and Objectives
The following fundamental research design steps will be undertaken:
Qualitative literature review on the security modelling and planning for ultra-dense vehicular adhoc network (VANET)
Comprehensive overview on the threat vectors associated with the VANET and CAVs and relationships with static wireless communication security standards
Modelling of a novel cryptographic security scenario considering the dynamic nature of VANET together with simulated environment focussed on vehicle hijacking
Experimental evaluation of the framework utilizing the road network data obtained from various sources
The deliverables and research outcomes from this project will enable significant technical knowledge in securing the CAV. Specifically, the deliverables and research outcomes for the project are
Technical architecture and novel dynamic security framework for ultra-dense VANET scenario
Mathematical modelling and analysis by focussing on the theoretical validation of the proposed architecture
Simulator and testbed development by utilizing real time data
4/3* research papers
Publicly shared data repository and the simulator/testbed
Funding Notes
This opportunity is open to UK, EU and Overseas applicants.
This project is being considered for funding, but this is not guaranteed. Should funding be attached to this project, this will be for the equivalent of UK/EU fees plus an annual stipend - Overseas applicants will, therefore, need to pay the difference in fees in this instance.
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