Whether as telecommunications or power systems, networks are very important in everyday life. Maintaining these networks properly functional and connected, even under attacks or failures, is of special concern. This topic has been previously studied with a whole network robustness perspective,modeling networks as undirected graphs (such as roads or simply cables). This perspective measures the average behavior of the network after its last node has failed. In this article we propose two alternatives to well-known studies about the robustness of the backbone Internet: to use a supply network model and metrics for its representation (we called it the Go-Index), and to use robustness metrics that can be calculated while disconnections appear. Our research question is: if a smart adversary has a limited number of strikes to attack the Internet, how much will the damage be after each one in terms of network disconnection? Our findings suggest that in order to design robust networks it might be better to have a complete view of the robustness evolution of the network, from both the infrastructure and the users perspective.
We develop a graph-theoretic model for service-oriented networks and propose metrics that quantify the resilience of such networks under node and edge failures. These metrics are based on the topological structure of the network and the manner in which services are distributed over the network. We present efficient algorithms to determine the maximum number of node and edge failures that can be tolerated by a given service-oriented network. These algorithms rely on known algorithms for computing minimum cuts in graphs. We also present efficient algorithms for optimally allocating services over a given network so that the resulting service-oriented network can tolerate single node or edge failures. These algorithms are derived through a careful analysis of the decomposition of the underlying network into appropriate types of connected components. As the Internet becomes increasingly important to all aspects of society, the consequences of disruption become increasingly severe. Thus it is critical to increase the resilience and survivability of the future network. We define resilience as the ability of the network to provide desired service even when challenged by attacks, large-scale disasters, and other failures. This paper describes a comprehensive methodology to evaluate network resilience using a combination of analytical and simulation techniques with the goal of improving the resilience and survivability of the Future Internet.