Controversy-Adjudication-Based Trust Management Mechanism in the Internet of Underwater Things

Owing to the characteristics of underwater communication, such as limited bandwidth, low transmission speed, and long delivery delay, it is significantly challenging to address trust management in the Internet of Underwater Things (IoUT). In the process of trust calculation, trust judgments between nodes may be conflicting based on the obtained diverse trust evidences. However, in existing studies, the analysis of trust-conflict adjudication is nonexhaustive and lacking in detail. Therefore, a controversy-adjudication method is proposed in this study to handle conflict recommendations, and a novel trust management mechanism is further investigated based on the controversy-adjudication method, including three phases: 1) trust calculation; 2) trust recommendation; and 3) trust evaluation. First, trust evidences, e.g., packet delivery ratio, end-to-end packet transmission latency, and residual energy, are collected to calculate trust for trustees. In addition, for the trustor without sufficient trust evidences, recommendations are required and an incentive mechanism is proposed based on the prisoner's dilemma to encourage neighbors to participate in trust recommendation. Finally, trust values of trustees are obtained by executing trust evaluation based on the controversy-adjudication mechanism. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed trust management mechanism outperforms existing related works in terms of accuracy and robustness against unreliable IoUT.

Automated summary

In this study, a controversy-adjudication method is proposed to handle conflict recommendations in trust calculation, and a novel trust management mechanism is investigated based on this method. The mechanism includes three phases: trust calculation, trust recommendation, and trust evaluation. Trust evidences are collected to calculate trust for trustees, and recommendations are provided for trustors without sufficient evidences. An incentive mechanism based on the prisoner's dilemma is proposed to encourage participation in trust recommendation. Trust values are obtained through trust evaluation using the controversy-adjudication mechanism. Simulation results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed mechanism in terms of accuracy and robustness against unreliable IoUT.