Faculty of Electronics, Communications and Automation

Department of Communications and Networking

I am offering a range of subjects in the context of my research interests listed above for special assignments and master theses. While I also accept theoretical work and simulations, my focus is clearly on engineering, meaning that I expect a workable product (e.g., a piece of code running on a PC or an embedded device). Hence, you may require well-developed coding, debugging, and possibly other practical skills. For practical reasons, I can only supervise theses that are written in English language.

Your thesis can also be connected to your day job in a company. It just should fit roughly into my general field of Internet technologies, communications, and distributed systems. See below for external theses topics.

Important: For writing a thesis, the general rules of Comnet apply. Please take particular note of the thesis process instructions and the thesis content guidelines. Please also note that you are expected to have completed your special assignment before embarking on an MSc thesis.

I am offering thesis topics in general in my areas of research, sometimes in the context of specific research topics, sometimes to start exploring new areas. Overall, I live somewhere between the networking and the application layer, but my interests also include the political and financial layers to some extent. The topic areas include but are surely not limited to (in no specific order):

• Delay-tolerant Networking: protocol and application design and implementation
• DTN routing and simulations
• DTN testbeds, trials, and monitoring
• Mobility modeling and simulations
• Adaptive real-time communication using RTP/RTCP
• Innovative uses of SIP
• Media streaming and RTSP
• Energy awareness (not just) for mobile devices and the interaction with protocol design
• Various kinds of real-world data collection
• Transport protocol design specifically for multipath communications and rapidly changing path conditions
• Mobility and robustness support in today's and future Internet architectures.

This list is naturally incomplete and out-of-date. So, please contact me also on related topics.

Distributed denial of service attacks: historical analysis and survey

The topic of this Master's thesis work is to study the historical trends of the distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Distributed denial of service attacks are a widespread problem in the Internet. The attacker typically controls a botnet, a large number of compromised hosts, which it uses to send large volumes of traffic to the victim, thus overwhelming the network link connecting the target to the rest of the Internet.

There has been some work in the area of studying how DDoS attacks are accomplished and how prevalent they are. The purpose of this work is two-fold. First, to draw existing work together to gain a good understanding of what we already know and then use existing databases of DDoS attacks (if they can be made available) to make statistical analysis of historical trends of DDoS attacks. For example, the student can study the historical trends in the size distribution of attacks measured by number of participating hosts or the volume of attack.

Mikko Juhani Pitkänen: Managing Data in the Grid and in Challenging Networking Environments. Licentiate Thesis, TKK Comnet, 2008.

Boris Nikolaus: Improving Efficienc and Enhancing Utilizability of Media-on-Demand Systems. Dissertation, Universität Bremen, 2008. (effective supervisor and 2nd reviewer)

Olaf Bergmann: A framework for aggregation of presence information based on user-provisioned rules. Dissertation, Universität Bremen, 2007. (effective supervisor and 2nd reviewer)

Dirk Kutscher: Local Coordination for Interpersonal Communication Systems. Dissertation, Universität Bremen, 2003. (effective supervisor)

Pauli Kongas: Exchanging Prerequisites for Trusted Communication in a Mobile Signature Mesh. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Päivi Parviainen: Securing Real-time Transport Protocol-based Media Traffic in the IP Multimedia Subsystem. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Ville Ryhänen: Converting CORBA-based Fault Management to SNMP. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Efsun Gürlek: Specifying and Verifying Requirements for Transmission of Medical Data in Public Networks. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Jukka Collan: Secure Authentication and Authorization Portal Based on Single Sign-on MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Jouni Petrow: Networking In Closed-Loop Product Lifecycle Management. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Toni Sebastian Pesonen: Applying Veritas Provisioning Manager in Multimedia Messaging Service backup and installation processes MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Michael Peltonen: Security Event Collection within a Distributed Heterogeneous Networking Environment. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Na Ni: Keyword-driven Automated Performance Testing of User Interfaces: a Case Study for the Open Element Management System Suite. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Jegadish Devadoss: Data Distribution over an Overlay Network. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Jukka Kommeri: System Management in Server-based Computing with Virtualization. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2009.

Mwesiga W. Barongo: Dimensioning Mobile WIMAX in the Access and Core Network: A Case Study. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Jukka Lehtniemi: Protection Concerns using Switched Ethernet as Internal Bus for a Telecommunication Network Element. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Marko Repo: Supporting Group Mobility in Mission-Critical Wireless Networks for SIP-based Applications MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Ari Keränen: Host Identity Protocol-based Network Address Translator Traversal in Peer-to-Peer Environments. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Mikko Rönö: Performance Optimization of UMTS Radio Network towards Quality of Service. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Ilkka Kiiskinen: Session Initiation Protocol-based Media Server Control Protocols. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Jarna Hälinen: Email Service Problem Base and Solution Ideas. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008

Pasi Antero Lehto: Service Provider Considerations for Offering Presence Services with SIP. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Frans Ekman. Mobility Models for Mobile Ad Hoc Network Simulations. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Lauri Peltola: Enabling DTN-based Web Access: the Server Side. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Lu Xiaojun: Disruption Tolerance for SIP. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Tuomas Kareinen: Delivering reputation information in centralized systems. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Antti Mattila: Best Practices for Network Infrastructure Management -- A Case Study of Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Kari-Pekka Perttula: Evolution of the Media Gateway in CDMA2000-Based Layered Architecture Core Network. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Lauri Silvennoinen: Legacy Network Address Translator Traversal Using the Host Identity Protocol. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2008.

Pekka Tapio Nurmi: Securing Access to Mobile Operator Core Networks Using IKEv2. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Ken Uchida: Characterizing hop-by-hop and end-to-end performance in a static wireless multihop environment. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Samuli Pyökkö: A Requirements-based Assessment of SIP Servers. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Heidi-Maria Rissanen: Mechanisms for Robust Multimedia Conferencing Using SIP. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Mona Saxena: Test Automation Analysis in System Testing for the Intelligent Packet Core. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Juho Seppänen: Prospects of Peer-to-Peer SIP for Mobile Operators. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2007.

Wille Wahlroos: Replicating Information in a Power Distribution Management System. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Heikki Keränen: An Overview of Mobile IPv6 Home Agent Redundancy. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Mikko Hautala: Mobile IPv6 performance in 802.11 networks: handover optimizations on the link and network layer: MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Juhani Hietikko: Implementation of MAC-c Protocol for an Improved UMTS Internet Access. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Antti Leskelä: Usable Security: Finding Solutions for Bringing Usability to Security Products. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Omar Mukhtar: Design and Implementation of Bundle Protocol Stack for Delay-Tolerant Networking. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2006.

Mikko Viitanen: Measuring Media Gateway Software Efficiency Using Performance Monitor Counters. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2005.

Esko Harjama: Investigation and Evaluation of Systems for Generating Automatic Alerts Using Honeynet Data. MSc thesis, Helsinki University of Technology, 2005.