Comparative studies on authentication and key exchange methods for 802.11 wireless LAN

IEEE 802.11 wireless LAN has become one of the hot topics on the design and development of network access technologies. In particular, its authentication and key exchange (AKE) aspects, which form a vital building block for modern security mechanisms, deserve further investigation. In this paper we first identify the general requirements used for WLAN authentication and key exchange (AKE) methods, and then classify them into three levels (mandatory, recommended, and additional operational requirements). We present a review of issues and proposed solutions for AKE in 802.11 WLANs. Three types of existing methods for addressing AKE issues are identified, namely, the legacy, layered and access control-based AKE methods. Then, we compare these methods against the identified requirements. Based on the analysis, a multi-layer AKE framework is proposed, together with a set of design guidelines, which aims at a flexible, extensible and efficient security as well as easy deployment.