Date of Award

3-2003

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Department

Department of Systems Engineering and Management

First Advisor

Rusty O. Baldwin, PhD

Abstract

Soon, advancements in data encryption technology will make real-time decryption of the contents of network packets virtually impossible. This research anticipates this development and extracts useful information based on packet level characteristics. Distinguishing characteristics from e-mail, HTTP, print, and FTP applications are identified and analyzed. The analysis of collected data from an ad-hoc wireless network reveals that distinguishing characteristics of network traffic do indeed exist. These characteristics include packet size, packet frequency, inter-packet correlation, and channel utilization. Without knowing the contents of packets or the direction of the traffic flow, the applications accessing the wireless network can be determined.

AFIT Designator

AFIT-GIR-ENG-03-03

DTIC Accession Number

ADA415380

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