Ecological Network-Inspired Trust Management Model of P2P Networks

The anonymous, open nature of P2P networks offers an almost ideal environment for the free-riders and the malicious peers spreading the inauthentic files and viruses. Evaluation of trustworthiness of participating peers is an effective method to simulate to offer content and services and mitigate the selfish behavior of unreliable or malicious peers. Similar to other security related protocols, trust management is an attractive target for adversaries. In this paper, we present a trust management model inspired from energy mechanism of ecological network, and then implement a trust evaluation that peer´s trust value is transformed into own energy for controlling peers´ behaviors in networks. Through P2P network simulation experiments, we find significant performance gains in using this system. The trust management model can significantly improve the network resources sharing as well as effectively help minimize selfish and malicious peers in the network.