Electronic payment is a key building block of distributed business applications in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). However, existing payment systems do not fulfill the requirements imposed by the highly dynamic and decentralized nature of MANETs. Either they rely on digital coins that suffer from usability problems, or they build on cellular phone technology which is bound to the availability of a fixed infrastructure. Therefore, we propose PAYFLUX, as a new system for electronic payment in MANETs. It is based on the light-weight Simple Public Key Infrastructure (SPKI) that allows for the decentralized creation and delegation of authorizations. Adopting the well-known abstraction of direct debits and enhancing it with new useful features, it offers good usability and can be easily integrated into the existing banking system.
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