Attack, defence, and contagion in networks

Goyal, Sanjeev; Vigier, Adrien

Abstract

© The Author 2014. Connections between individuals facilitate the exchange of goods, resources, and information and create benefits. These connections may be exploited by adversaries to spread their attacks as well. What is the optimal way to design and defend networks in the face of attacks? We develop a model with a Designer and an Adversary. The Designer moves first and chooses a network and an allocation of defence resources across nodes. The Adversary then allocates attack resources on nodes; if an attack succeeds then the Adversary decides on how successful resources should navigate the network. We obtain two principal results. One, we show that in a wide variety of circumstances a star network with all defence resources allocated to the central node is optimal for the Designer. Two, we identify conditions on the technology of conflict, network value function, and the resource configuration for which networks with multiple hubs/components are optimal.

Citation

Goyal, S., & Vigier, A. (2014). Attack, defence, and contagion in networks. Review of Economic Studies, 81(4), 1518-1542. https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdu013

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 1, 2014
• Online Publication Date: Jul 30, 2014
• Publication Date: 2014-10
• Deposit Date: Sep 22, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 22, 2020
• Journal: Review of Economic Studies
• Print ISSN: 0034-6527
• Electronic ISSN: 1467-937X
• Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 81
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 1518-1542
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdu013
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/4920408
• Publisher URL: https://academic.oup.com/restud/article-abstract/81/4/1518/1571797
• Additional Information: This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced version of an article accepted for publication in Review of Economic Studies following peer review. The version of record Sanjeev Goyal, Adrien Vigier, Attack, Defence, and Contagion in Networks, The Review of Economic Studies, Volume 81, Issue 4, October 2014, Pages 1518–1542 is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdu013