Shout to Secure: Physical-Layer Wireless Security with Known Interference

This paper proposes a physical-layer security scheme for wireless networks, aiming to achieve communication secrecy by making the eavesdropper incapable of decoding the secret wireless message. The considered scenario features one user within the range of two access points, API and AP2. The APs are assumed to be connected through an alternative secure (e.g. wired) connection. The goal is to secure the wireless link between the user and API. While the user transmits to API, AP2 simultaneously transmits an interfering signal, which is a priori provided to API, such that API is likely the only node capable of decoding the user's entire transmission. Evaluation is done through simulation by measuring the upper bound of the information-theoretic secrecy and error performance. In the latter case it is shown that the eavesdropper experiences significantly higher error rates than the intended receiver, thus providing evidence of practical security.