A review of attacker-defender games: Current state and paths forward

Hunt, Kyle; Zhuang, Jun

doi:10.1016/j.ejor.2023.04.009

Cited by 24 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 152 publications

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“…No additional experiments were found that could be included in the reanalysis. This is not surprising given our restrictive inclusion criteria and because the attacker–defender contest is a recent advance in the behavioral game literature (De Dreu & Gross, 2019b) with most work being theoretical rather than experimental (for a review, see Hunt & Zhuang, 2023). In short, to our knowledge, all studies available for our research questions are included in the reanalyses (i.e., there is no file drawer).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…COMPETITION AND CONFLICT Hunt & Zhuang, 2023). In short, to our knowledge, all studies available for our research questions are included in the reanalyses (i.e., there is no file drawer).…”

Section: Identifying Eligible Studies For Reanalysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In games of strategy like the prisoner’s dilemma, randomly switching between actions has no clear advantages, and agents do not need to care about their counterpart being able to predict their next move (Axelrod & Hamilton, 1981; Camerer, 2003; Sheldon, 1999). This is different in games of strategy with its equilibrium in mixed strategies, such as hide-and-seek games (Bar-Hillel, 2015; Lahat-Rania & Kareev, 2023), best-shot-weakest link games (Clark & Konrad, 2007), inspection games (Nosenzo et al, 2016), and colonel-blotto and attacker–defender contest games (Chowdhury et al, 2021; Chowdhury & Topolyan, 2016; De Dreu & Gross, 2019b; Hunt & Zhuang, 2023; Roberson, 2006). In hide-and-seek games, for example, hiders want to be where seekers are not looking, yet seekers want to look where hiders are hidden.…”

Section: Unpredictability In Conflict and Competitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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On being unpredictable and winning.

De Dreu,

Gross,

Arciniegas

et al. 2024

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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In theory, it can be strategically advantageous for competitors to make themselves unpredictable to their opponents, for example, by variably mixing hostility and friendliness. Empirically, it remains open whether and how competitors make themselves unpredictable, why they do so, and how this conditions conflict dynamics and outcomes. We examine these questions in interactive attacker-defender contests, in which attackers invest to capture resources held and defended by their opponent. Study 1, a reanalysis of nine (un)published experiments (total N = 650), reveals significant cross-trial variability especially in proactive attacks and less in reactive defense. Study 2 (N = 200) shows that greater variability makes both attacker's and defender's next move more difficult to predict, especially when variability is due to occasional rather than (in)frequent extreme investments in conflict. Studies 3 (N = 27) and 4 (N = 106) show that precontest testosterone, a hormone associated with risk-taking and status competition, drives variability during attack which, in turn, increases sympathetic arousal in defenders and defender variability (Study 4). Rather than being motivated by wealth maximization, being unpredictable in conflict and competition emerges in function of the attacker's desire to win "no matter what" and comes with significant welfare cost to both victor and victim.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…COMPETITION AND CONFLICT Hunt & Zhuang, 2023). In short, to our knowledge, all studies available for our research questions are included in the reanalyses (i.e., there is no file drawer).…”

Section: Identifying Eligible Studies For Reanalysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Unpredictability In Conflict and Competitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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On being unpredictable and winning.

De Dreu,

Gross,

Arciniegas

et al. 2024

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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“…Moreover, game theory has been used to solve the problem of resource-constrained resources and the security defense level. The survey in [24,25] summarized the methods that have been adopted to solve attacker-defender games and found that the current attacker-defender games that focus on technology adoption assume that the defender will deploy a single new technology at all target sites. The work discussed the future trends and research directions for applying game theory models in edge services and considering usage scenarios.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mean-Field Stackelberg Game-Based Security Defense and Resource Optimization in Edge Computing

Miao,

Li,

et al. 2024

Applied Sciences

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Edge computing brings computation and storage resources to the edge of the mobile network to solve the problems of low latency and high real-time demand. However, edge computing is more vulnerable to malicious attacks due to its open and dynamic environments. In this article, we investigate security defense strategies in edge computing systems, focusing on scenarios with one attacker and multiple defenders to determine optimal defense strategies with minimal resource allocation. Firstly, we formulate the interactions between the defenders and the attackers as the mean-field Stackelberg game model, where the state and the objective functions of the defenders are coupled through the mean-field term, and are strongly influenced by the strategy of the attacker. Then, we analyze the local optimal strategies of the defenders given an arbitrary strategy of the attackers. We demonstrate the Nash equilibrium and the mean-field equilibrium for both the defenders and the attackers. Finally, simulation analysis will illustrate the dynamic evolution of the defense strategy of the defenders and the trajectory of the attackers based on the proposed Stackelberg game model.

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Signaling the Capability of New Counterterrorism Technologies in the Face of a Strategic Threat

Tokel,

Hunt,

Zhuang

2024

Naval Research Logistics

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When implementing new security technologies (e.g., cargo scanners at ports), security and defense agencies face important decisions regarding the disclosure of related information to the public. Public disclosure of these technologies can grant adversarial organizations access to critical security‐related information, enabling them to potentially develop or adjust their attack strategies to circumvent defense systems. Alternatively, withholding information about newly deployed technologies can create uncertainties for adversaries regarding the effectiveness of defense systems. In this work, we study defensive information disclosure related to the deployment of new security technology, focusing on the level of technical information released by the defender and how this affects the adversary's (i) belief about the technology's capability (in detecting or otherwise thwarting an attack) and (ii) attack plan. Specifically, we introduce a novel signaling model in which the defender has private information about the (level of) capability of her technology, and decides on the level of related technical detail to be disclosed. The attacker, upon receiving the defender's signal, updates his belief about the capability of the technology and subsequently decides whether to launch an attack. We obtain and prove closed‐form equilibrium solutions to the model and conduct numerical sensitivity analyses to understand how the equilibrium strategies change as the model's data varies. Based on the equilibrium conditions, we also characterize and analyze four unique scenarios that partition the solution space based on relations between the defender's signaling costs.

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A review of attacker-defender games: Current state and paths forward

Cited by 24 publications

References 152 publications

On being unpredictable and winning.

On being unpredictable and winning.

Mean-Field Stackelberg Game-Based Security Defense and Resource Optimization in Edge Computing

Signaling the Capability of New Counterterrorism Technologies in the Face of a Strategic Threat

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