Physical Layer Security of IRS Assisted Wireless Networks Using Directional Modulation

Abstract

Physical layer security is becoming an emerging and vital feature in wireless communications. In contrast to cryptographic techniques employed in the application layer, physical layer security uses a different approach that exploits advanced signal processing techniques. One of the physical layer security techniques uses directional modulation, which distorts signal modulations along the directions of the eavesdroppers. The performance of directional modulation techniques can be improved further by using intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRS). In the literature, IRS has been used to improve the signal quality at the desired user while simultaneously suppressing the signal strength at the undesired user. In this paper, we investigate the performance of directional modulation with artificial noise in the presence of an IRS. The bit error rate (BER) results show that the proposed method delivers data to a legitimate user with low error probability while it raises the error rates at the eavesdroppers located near the legitimate user.