Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) consist of hundreds, or thousands of sensor nodes distributed over a wide area and used as the Internet of Things (IoT) devices to benefit many home users and autonomous systems industries. With many users adopting WSN-based IoT technology, ensuring that the sensor's information is protected from attacks is essential. Many attacks interrupt WSNs, such as Quality of Service (QoS) attacks, malicious nodes, and routing attacks. To combat these attacks, especially on the routing attacks, we need to detect the attacker nodes and prevent them from any access to WSN. Although some survey studies on routing attacks have been published, a lack of systematic studies on detecting WSN routing attacks can be seen in the literature. This study enhances the topic with a taxonomy of current and emerging detection techniques for routing attacks in wireless sensor networks to improve QoS. This article uses a PRISMA flow diagram for a systematic review of 87 articles from 2016 to 2022 based on eight routing attacks: wormhole, sybil, Grayhole/selective forwarding, blackhole, sinkhole, replay, spoofing, and hello flood attacks. The review also includes an evaluation of the metrics and criteria used to evaluate performance. Researchers can use this article to fill in any information gaps within the WSN routing attack detection domain.
Keywords: Blackhole attack; Grayhole attack; Hello flood attack; Internet of things; Routing attacks detection; Sinkhole attack; Spoofing attack; Sybil attack; Wireless sensor networks; Wormhole attack.
© 2022 Alansari et al.