CP and pilot jamming attacks on SC-FDMA: Performance tests with software defined radios

Abstract

We designed and implemented single carrier-frequency domain multiple access (SC-FDMA) based system by using software defined radio (SDR) nodes. We aimed to investigate the performance of an LTE system against smart jamming attacks, which target synchronization and channel estimation processes. Cyclic prefix (CP) based jamming attacks and pilot jamming attacks are evaluated and observed for both uplink and downlink directions of an LTE-like system. Based on error vector magnitude measurements, we observed that an SC-FDMA system is more sensitive to CP and pilot jamming attacks when compared to OFDMA.