Rajant Corporation - Wireless Mesh Networks for Military Applications

Rajant Corporation develops portable meshing wireless LAN products for instant, mobile, wireless broadband connectivity for military, first responder and mining applications. Rajant has engineered a line of portable battery-powered units called BreadCrumbs that can create secure wireless mobile networks at the flip of a switch. Rajant offers a full range of security and encryption from WEP to Type 1 SecNet 11 encryption, and options for stringent US government security standards, including FIPS 140-2.

Rajant's meshing, auto-configuring and self-adaptable BreadCrumbs offer flexibility by creating multiple secure and steady connections with other BreadCrumbs, and allowing connections to remotely located resources (command centers, satellite or microwave connections, or network operation centers).

Typical military applications include video surveillance, convoy security, perimeter security, temporary command post, sensor aggregation and managements, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV), Voice-over-IP (VoIP) communications, IED response and avoidance, monitor potentially hostile surroundings, emergency response, military training and large quick-deployable network infrastructure.

THE BREADCRUMB INSTANT WIRELESS IP NETWORK

For over five years, the success of the BreadCrumb family of products has been translated in various deployments by the armed forces and first responders around the globe. Recent exercises with the Department of Defense, US Army, Thai Army, Canadian Emergency Management teams and other military exercises within the US have proved the credibility and capacity of Rajant's BreadCrumb products.

With a single flip of a switch to turn on the battery-powered units, each BreadCrumb will automatically configure itself, connect to adjacent units, and be ready for mission in about a minute. Each BreadCrumb includes an Ethernet connector for connectivity to satellite or microwave backhaul radios, video cameras or other IP devices.

There are many flexible options for BreadCrumb units, including:

• Multi 802.11b, 802.11b/g radios
• Battery configuration and external power source – up to 48 hours battery life
• Encryption (up to Type1 SecNet11)
• Radio power levels
• Antenna configurations
• Portable, rack mount, or vehicle mount
• Video connector/CODEC options
• Intrinsically-safe options
• External connector type, annunciator style
• FIPS 140-2 options

INSTAMESH MULTI-ROUTING NETWORK TECHNOLOGY

InstaMesh technology is the highly sophisticated software that runs on each BreadCrumb device. Each BreadCrumb is meshed with all adjoining units to provide resiliency in the network through multi-routing.

A key differentiator in InstaMesh technology is that each BreadCrumb can operate whilst moving at high speed on a vehicle. Some current Rajant installations involve hundreds of moving BreadCrumb wireless nodes. Each unit keeps track of its connections and configurations. This provides the highest level of network resiliency for mission applications.

BCADMIN SOFTWARE MANAGEMENT AND CONFIGURATION

BCAdmin is Rajant's monitoring and management application for BreadCrumb networks. Although not required to run a BreadCrumb network, BCAdmin provides a real-time view of the network topology as devices move or their statuses or environment change, and makes more advanced configuration options available to an administrator. Examples of these advanced options made available by BCAdmin are:

• Interconnectivity with other networks, both wired and wireless
• Port forwarding for BreadCrumbs configured as gateways
• Access control, security, and encryption settings
• Remote zeroization of encryption keys
• Manual radio channel settings
• SSID settings
• DHCP server management
• Meshing and access point settings for each radio

WIRELESS SECURITY AND WIRELESS ENCRYPTION

Rajant BreadCrumbs have many options available for wireless security and encryption:

• Access control lists
• WEP
• Third-party VPNs
• Type 1 encryption with Harris SecNet 11
• 256-bit AES FIPS 140-2

Rajant Corporation continues to move forward everyday, challenging high-end technology in the field of telecommunications, networks and data security.