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Network protocols are the basis of network communication, and security concerns about protocol aspects are always important and useful in network systems. For the past two decades, the methods of protocol testing have been used to verify the functional conformance between the network specifications and the implementations. In this paper, we extend protocol testing methods by considering the robustness of the network protocols. We suggest a method for modeling network systems with concurrent components and propose a robustness testing approach to evaluate the system security. A new definition of Glued_IOLTS is used to define this kind of system, and an algorithm for robustness test case generation is given. A case study with the RADIUS protocol is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Network protocols often have time constraints. Robustness testing of network protocol with time constraints aims to detect vulnerabilities of its implementation. However, related theory is not well developed. This paper proposes a novel Timed NPEFSM model containing sufficient inputs with various time values and their processing rules to formalize complex protocol with time constraints. In order to test delay transitions, Grid Timed NPEFSM is proposed and it can be generated by state characterization of Timed NPEFSM based on time sampling. Thus, these two models jointly guide robustness testing of protocol with time constraints. For test generation, we propose timed anomalous test case in which only state under test is characterized by time sampling and this method can simplify test sequences largely without compromising test coverage. We also propose several strategies to construct test sequences for timed transitions. To inject test data efficiently and effectively, three types of timed compound anomalous test cases are proposed and the algorithm of generating timed compound anomalous test cases considering both single-field and multi-field mutations is then presented. Standard test specification language TTCN-3 is extended to describe timed compound anomalous test case. We illustrate our test method using an intra-domain routing protocol OSPFv2. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. This paper presents a formal approach to robustness testing of network protocol with time constraints. We propose a novel Timed NPEFSM model to formalize complex protocol with time constraints and then timed compound anomalous test cases considering both single-field and multi-field mutations can be generated from the formal model. Standard test specification language TTCN-3 is extended to describe timed compound anomalous test cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The protocol testing technology used in the next generation Internet should satisfy some new challenges and requirements. This paper focuses on the test suite description and test implementation techniques. TTCN-3 is chosen as the test suite description language and extended in both syntax and semantics to satisfy the requirements of protocol robustness testing. PITSv3, a protocol integrated testing system based on TTCN-3, is developed, and the extensions for robustness testing are implemented. Finally, two practical test applications are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interoperability testing is an important technique to ensure the quality of implementations of network communication protocol. In the next generation Internet protocol, real-time applications should be supported effectively. However, time constraints were not considered in the related studies of protocol interoperability testing, so existing interoperability testing methods are difficult to be applied in real-time protocol interoperability testing. In this paper, a formal method to real-time protocol interoperability testing is proposed. Firstly, a formal model CMpTIOA (communicating multi-port timed input output automata) is defined to specify the system under test (SUT) in real-time protocol interoperability testing; based on this model, timed interoperability relation is then defined. In order to check this relation, a test generation method is presented to generate a parameterized test behavior tree from SUT model; a mechanism of executability pre-determination is also integrated in the test generation method to alleviate state space explosion problem to some extent. The proposed theory and method are then applied in interoperability testing of IPv6 neighbor discovery protocol to show the feasibility of this method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The community of software testing and that of protocol testing are traditionally disjoint. It is seldom the case that protocol testing experts present papers at the large software testing conferences and vice versa. This raises the question about the peculiarities of protocol testing with respect to general software testing. Here we will examine those peculiarities and the consequences in terms of specific methodology developed for protocol testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a novel approach to testing fault-tolerant and real-time protocol implementations. Cesium, our testing environment, executes the protocols in a centralized simulator of the distributed system. It simulates the occurrence of inputs and the failure scenarios the protocols are designed to tolerate, while automatically verifying that the required safety and timeliness properties hold at all times during test experiments. Within this framework, the human tester can define failure operations that simulate every failure class studied in the literature. We apply our approach to two fault-tolerant protocols typical in embedded systems. The results show that Cesium can pinpoint implementation errors that would be very difficult to identify in a real system, and can also compute accurate performance predictions that would be problematic to measure in the real embedded platform without ad hoc hardware instrumentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are two aspects to testing: 1) the selection of appropriate test inputs and 2) the analysis of the observed interactions of the implementation under test (IUT) in order to determine whether the observed input/output trace conforms to the IUT's specification. The paper analyzes the second aspect with particular attention to testing of communication protocol implementations. Various distributed test architectures are used for this purpose, where partial input/output traces are observable by "local observers" at different interfaces. The error detection power of different test configurations is determined, based on the partial trace visible to each local observer and their global knowledge about the applied test case. The automated construction of trace analysis modules from the formal specification of the protocol is also discussed. Different transformations of the protocol specification may be necessary to obtain the "reference specification" which can be used by a local or global observer for checking the observed trace. This checking possibly involves the "nondeterministic execution" of the reference specification. Experience with the construction of an arbiter for the OSI Transport protocol is described. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dependability is a keyword within the recent discussion about the operation of Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) as a vital part of the ever-growing Internet of Things (IoT). However, while focusing on, e.g., reliable routing it is often neglected that the energy supply is an important factor to enable dependable WSN, and thus IoT operation. Using the example of the Routing Protocol for Low power and Lossy Networks (RPL) we will show that a high operational capability is often at the expense of energy resources. Nevertheless, we will also show that this issue can be mitigated. While the resilience of RPL has been verified in a plethora of existing evaluations, the impact of simple node resets on the energy efficiency has not been investigated so far. However, resets may happen for a variety of reasons which are stated in this work as well. Thus, in the first part of this paper we examine the energy costs of resets in a RPL network. We show that such temporary node failures can have a serious impact on the network's total energy usage depending on failure location and topology. As resets are common in real WSNs this work reveals an important weakness of RPL which can even be exploited for attacks. To mitigate this issue, in the second part of this paper we propose a hardening of RPL by maintaining a backup of the RPL state information in a non-volatile memory. Improvements as well as limitations of this approach and a mechanism for a seamless recovery are discussed and described in detail. Finally, the effectiveness and the characteristics of the proposed approach to harden RPL are evaluated extensively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As communications protocols are becoming more and more complex, efficient algorithms are needed for the problem of generating minimum-length test sequences. Existing algorithms generate test sequences based on one or more state-identification sequences for every state in a given finite-state machine. Some of these algorithms make an attempt to minimize the length of the test sequence to some prescribed extent. The optimal test sequence generation (OTSG) problem is concerned with finding the optimal (shortest in length) test sequence for a given finite-state machine using some state identification sequences. We prove that the OTSG problem is NP-complete. Therefore an efficient solution to the problem should not be expected in the general case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Various research activities require the programming of a large numbers of devices. This programming can be difficult to co-ordinate and organise, and requires considerable labour time. These issues often mean that testing on real hardware is abandoned or taken only to small scale implementation thus limiting the real-world findings. The method described in this paper adopts a three-tiered approach to programming large numbers of devices. Tier 1 is comprised of a single Master Controller which is networked to individual tower modules, these towers form the final 2 tiers with the Local Controller as tier 2 and up-to 15 target devices forming tier 3. The Master Controller co-ordinates and distributes the code for each device to the Local Controller which then programs the target devices. In the domain of networking this allows for: •Large networks of varied protocols to be programmed quickly, since towers are programmed in parallel, additional towers don't extend programming times.•Distributed networks are possible since towers are controlled over Ethernet.•Dramatically reduced labour time and defect rates due to human error in setting up devices.•This paper presents the implementation of this method for IoT Networking research with ESP-01 Target devices., (© 2019 The Authors.)