As location becomes an increasingly important piece of context information regarding
a device, so too must the method of providing this information increase in reliability.
In many situations, false location information may impact the security or objectives of
the system to which it has been supplied. Research concerning localization and location
verication addresses this issue. The majority of solutions, however, revolve around a
trusted infrastructure to provide a certied location.
This thesis presents an enhanced design for a location verication system, moving
verication away from infrastructure-based approaches. Instead, an ad hoc approach is
presented, employing regular local devices in the role usually reserved for trusted entities
- the role of the evidence provider.
We begin with an introduction to the area of localization, outlining the primary techniques
employed. We summarize previous approaches, highlighting the improvements and
outstanding issues of each. Following this, we outline a novel metric for use with distance
bounding to increase the accuracy of evidence extracted from the distance bounding
process. We show through emulation that this metric is feasible within an IEEE 802.11
wireless network.
We detail the Secure Location Verication Proof Gathering Protocol (SLVPGP), a
protocol designed to protect the process of evidence gathering. We employ our novel metric
to conrm the presence of a device in an area. We repeatedly extend the SLVPGP's basic
design to form three protocols, each with increasingly stronger security. These protocols
are formally veried to conrm their specied security properties.
To complete the design of our verication system, we present two approaches to judging
a claim based on the evidence supplied. We demonstrate the accuracy of these approach
through simulation. We also include a brief outline of the concept of reputation and discuss
an existing appr