DTN Security Key Architecture

Project Overview

Welcome to the NASA Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) project. DTN is an approach to computer network architecture that seeks to address the technical issues in heterogeneous networks that may lack continuous network connectivity.

Note that some literature may use the term Delay Tolerant Network which is also abbreviated as DTN - the two terms are used interchangeably.

DTN is designed to provide reliable end-to-end delivery of information between nodes, and to do so in an environment that experiences frequent connectivity disruptions and topology changes. Such a capability will directly support human and robotic space exploration, as well as have wide applicability to land-mobile and airborne terrestrial communications.

Learn more about DTN

Competition Overview

The goal of this challenge is to architect the proposed solution to the key exchange problem so that competitors in downstream development challenges will have one definitive document to refer to as we build out a working implementation.

Competition Requirements

This challenge differs from standard architecture challenges in a couple of ways:

• the contest input is non-standard i.e. there is only a specification document and no UI in the form of wireframes or storyboards. The target is a console-based application.

• strong experience with cryptographic and distributed computing concepts is required to properly understand all of the contest input.

Contest Input

• You may want to familiarize yourself with the expanded problem statement problem statement which was used to ellicit the 3-part solution in the contest input.

• The specification that combined the solution to Parts 1 - 3 is attached in the forum.

Review Criteria

Conciseness. Your submission must be written in clear and concise language so that it can easily be understood by developers who have little or not experience with the Byzantine Generals' Problem (BGP).
Coherence. Your submission should organize the 3-part solution into chapters. You should begin each chapter with a high level overview and each chapter and/or section must follow the preceeding one in a logical way.
Consistency. All definitions, notations and formatting must be consistent.
Clarity. You are expected to augment the illustrations in each solution with illustrations of your own. Non-trivial algorithm discussions should be accompanied with pseudocode and/or diagrams.

Keep in mind that all downstream contests specified in your submission will proceed straight to assembly.

Submission Deliverables

• System Design Specification (SDS) document written in an MS Word compatible document.

• Class and sequence diagrams authored using the TopCoder UML tool or MS Visio.

Please download the templates on which to base your submission on from here.

Final Deliverable

Your final deliverable should address all of the competition requirements listed in 1.1.1.
Please submit, in a compressed archive:

• a MS Word compatible document;

• the original source files of diagrams used to illustrate your document (if any).

Additional Documentation Provided

Document	Link
DTN introductory tutorial	Delay Tolerant Networks - A Tutorial
Supporting document - (DTN) networks	Rationale Scenarios and Requirements for DTN In Space
Supporting document - (DTN) security	Space Mission Key Management Concepts

To learn about the meaning of words, terms and abbreviations specific to DTN, please refer to the Glossary