Multiple attack localization and identification in all-optical networks

The security characteristics of currently emerging all-optical networks display many unique features compared to traditional communication networks. In particular, network transparency raises many security vulnerabilities that differ substantially from conventional failures and should therefore be treated differently. One of the serious problems related to transparency lies in the fact that optical crosstalk is additive and can be exploited to perform service disruption attacks upon the network. Since these attacks can spread rapidly through the network, causing additional problems and triggering multiple alarms, they must be detected and identified at any point in the network where they may occur. However, to monitor all wavelength channels at several detection points into any node is likely to be very expensive. In this paper we provide formal specifications for optical crosstalk that can arise in optical cross-connect nodes. Based on these specifications, we propose an algorithm for localizing the sources of multiple attacks and identifying their nature in all-optical networks.