Last updated: 2026-05-13 05:01 UTC
All documents
Number of pages: 163
| Author(s) | Title | Year | Publication | Keywords | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lal Verda Cakir, Mehmet Ali Erturk, Mehmet Ozdem, Berk Canberk | Digital Twin-assisted Handover Scheme for Mobile Networks using Generative AI | 2026 | Early Access | Electromagnetic propagation Propagation constant Radio broadcasting Radio networks Handover Communication systems Avatars Communication switching Data transfer Cellular networks digital twin 5G/6G handover management generative artificial intelligence | Handover management in mobile networks is challenged by high latency and reduced reliability in dense deployments and under user mobility. Here, existing schemes improve handover initiation by optimising the candidate handover at the decision time. However, these are applied after a non-negligible delay due to the control-plane signalling. Then, when applied, it may become invalid or degrade performance. To address this, we propose a Digital Twin (DT)-assisted handover scheme that performs predictive execution-time validation prior to the preparation of the Next Generation (NG)-based handover. To this end, the DT-What-If Generator (DT-WIG) is used to emulate short-horizon future network states under uncertainty. Here, the DT-WIG is a spatiotemporal graph generative model that uses variational latent sampling to generate counterfactual post-handover trajectories for the candidate handover decision. Then, the AMF estimates the failure and QoS risks associated with the candidate handover and approves/rejects it via standard-compliant signalling. With this, we form a policy-agnostic mechanism that runs on the underlying handover policy. Consequently, we evaluate performance using ns-3/5G-LENA trace generation and replay-based policy analysis, with OpenAirInterface-based signalling evaluation. The results show that the proposed method reduces the handover failure rate and handover interruption time while improving latency, jitter, throughput, and packet loss. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3690572 |
| Arad Kotzer, Tom Azoulay, Yoad Abels, Aviv Yaish, Ori Rottenstreich | SoK: DeFi Lending and Yield Aggregation Protocol Taxonomy, Empirical Measurements, and Security Challenges | 2026 | Early Access | Filtering Application specific integrated circuits Filters Protocols Smart contracts Communication systems Proof of stake Proof of Work Internet Amplitude shift keying Blockchain Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Lending Yield Aggregation | Decentralized Finance (DeFi) lending protocols implement programmable credit markets without intermediaries. This paper systematizes the DeFi lending ecosystem, spanning collateralized lending (including over- and under- collateralized designs, and zero-liquidation loans), uncollateralized primitives (e.g., flashloans), and yield aggregation protocols which allocate capital across underlying lending platforms. Beyond a taxonomy of mechanisms and comparing protocols, we provide empirical on-chain measurements of lending activity and user behavior, using Compound V2 and AAVE V2 as case studies, and connect empirical observations to protocol design choices (e.g., interestrate models and liquidation incentives). We then characterize vulnerabilities that arise due to notable designs, focusing on interestrate setting mechanisms and time-measurement approaches. Finally, we outline open questions at the intersection of mechanism design, empirical measurement and security for future research. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3682174 |
| Yuxiang Wang, Jiao Zhang, Leixin Cai, Tao Huang | Mercury: Multipath Spraying for Joint Congestion and Reordering Control in RDMA | 2026 | Early Access | Due to the low entropy traffic characteristics of LLM (Large Language Model) training, existing load balancing mechanisms such as Equal-Cost Multi-Path (ECMP) fail to fully utilize the redundant bandwidth between computing nodes in RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE). Packet spraying mechanism has become a typical solution to the load balancing problem in RoCEs. However, it has a negative effect on congestion control mechanisms and suffers severe out-of-order problems. In this paper, we propose Mercury, a host-driven spraying scheme that synergizes congestion feedback and reordering control. Mercury selects paths by leveraging ECN, RTT, and reordering metrics, adjusts rates via multi-metric window. It also employs receiver-side buffers with priority-based dropping to mitigate out-of-order penalties. Evaluations in ns-3 under AllReduce and All-to-All traffic show that Mercury consistently outperforms the ECMP-based baselines, including DCQCN, TIMELY, HPCC, SWIFT, and BOLT, with the largest reduction in Max FCT reaching 63%. Under multi-path load balancing, Mercury delivers the lowest Max FCT for large messages in AllReduce and for most message sizes in All-to-All. It outperforms STRACK and MP-RDMA by up to 28% and 35% in AllReduce, and by up to 25% and 30% in All-to-All. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3692452 | |
| Shaimaa Alkaabi, Mark A Gregory, Shuo Li | A Stateless Orchestrated Handover Protocol for Multi-Access Edge Computing | 2026 | Early Access | In Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) environments, session continuity during user mobility remains a pressing challenge due to decentralized infrastructure and high-throughput, latency-sensitive applications. Existing mobility protocols often rely on stateful mechanisms or centralized control, leading to increased signaling overhead, limited scalability, and vulnerability to performance degradation in dynamic networks. This paper introduces the Server Search and Select Algorithm Protocol (SSSAP), a lightweight, UDP-based handover protocol tailored for MEC deployments. The protocol is an extension of our previous work on a handover Server Search and Selection Algorithm (SSSA). SSSAP enables seamless session redirection through a three-phase signaling scheme (pre-handover, handover initiation, and handover termination), preserving service continuity without coupling session state to transport layers. The protocol’s design features extensible headers for multi-metric evaluation and future security adaptation while maintaining minimal dependency on intermediary control nodes. Through extensive simulation and testing, we have validated the SS-SAP efficiency across user equipment nodes and MEC servers. Results demonstrate high handover success rates, low-session setup delays, and balanced server load distribution. SSSAP achieves superior performance in mobility robustness, packet loss mitigation, and integration simplicity. The research outcomes position SSSAP as a scalable and application-agnostic mobility protocol for MEC systems, especially in vehicular and high-mobility scenarios. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3692555 | |
| Atri Mukhopadhyay, Dinesh Korukonda, Goutam Das | Design of Passive Optical Network Based O-RAN X-haul: A Systematic Approach | 2026 | Early Access | Timing Passive optical networks Optimization Delays Optical network units Ethernet Jitter Loading Copper Synchronization C-RAN Delay Jitter QCQP O-RAN PON | The development of high data rate communication technologies has resulted in cell densification, which in turn has led to the development of centralized radio access networks (C-RANs) followed by open radio access networks (O-RANs). The O-RAN segregates the base station into three logical entities; the central unit (CU), the distributed unit (DU) and the radio unit (RU). The CU, DU and RU require low latency, low jitter and high data rate connections for seamless operation, which is known as X-haul. A passive optical network (PON) is a potential solution for X-haul design. However, conventional PON uplink protocols are not inherently suitable for X-haul requirements. The packetization procedure of PON introduces jitter to the X-haul bit stream. Further, the delay requirements of the X-haul limit the number of sources that can be connected to the X-haul. Advanced features like coordinated multipoint requires synchronization among the different X-haul bit streams as well. Therefore, in this paper, we develop an optimal uplink system that allows PON to be used as an X-haul connection technology. The proposal maximizes the throughput of the PON while conforming to the delay and synchronization requirements. Moreover, the proposal nullifies the jitter introduced by the PON scheduler. We have performed extensive simulations for verifying our results. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3692242 |
| Jiale Zhu, Xiaoyao Zheng, Shukai Ye, Ming Zheng, Liping Sun, Liangmin Guo, Qingying Yu, Yonglong Luo | Federated Recommendation Model Based on Personalized Attention and Privacy-Preserving Dynamic Graph | 2026 | Early Access | Modeling Federated learning Privacy Recommender systems Training Educational institutions Servers Algorithms Conferences Graph neural networks Graph Neural Networks Federated Learning Personalized Recommendation Privacy Protection | Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) have been widely adopted in recommendation systems. When integrated into a federated learning framework, GNNs can enhance the model’s expressive capability. However, challenges arise in personalized representation and graph expansion due to the heterogeneity and locality of user data in federated recommendation systems. To address these challenges, we propose a federated recommendation model based on personalized attention and privacy-preserving dynamic graphs. The method first matches neighbor users for each selected client. Subsequently, it counts the interaction frequencies of items for both local and neighbor users to construct personalized weights, which captures the unique characteristics of different users. Additionally, we designs a method for constructing privacy-preserving dynamic graphs. In each round of federated training, the selected client adds pseudo-interaction items to its own interaction subgraph, perturbing the real interactions. After completing local training, the noisy interaction subgraph is incorporated into the global graph to capture higher-order connectivity information among users while safeguarding their interaction privacy. We conduct extensive experiments on three benchmark datasets, and the results demonstrate that the proposed PADG method achieves superior performance while effectively protecting privacy. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3691659 |
| Awaneesh Kumar Yadav, Madhusanka Liyanage, An Braeken | An Improved and Provably Secure EDHOC Protocol Supporting the Extended Canetti–Krawczyk (eCK) Security Model | 2026 | Early Access | Aerospace and electronic systems Telemetry Central Processing Unit Microcontrollers Microprocessors MIMICs Millimeter wave integrated circuits Monolithic integrated circuits Communication systems Internet of Things EDHOC OSCORE Key agreement Authentication extended Canetti–Krawczyk (eCK) attack model | Transport Layer Security (TLS) is considered to be the most used standard security protocol for the Internet of Things (IoT). However, as TLS was originally designed for computer networks, it is not optimal with respect to efficiency. Therefore, a new protocol called Object Security for Constrained RESTful Environments (OSCORE) has been standardized for securing constrained devices. Currently, the Ephemeral Diffie Hellman Over COSE (EDHOC) protocol, which is a key exchange protocol to define a session key used in OSCORE, is also in the process of being standardized. This paper shows that the four authentication modes of the EDHOC protocol are vulnerable in the extended Canetti–Krawczyk (eCK) security model, which is a common security model used in IoT. In addition, also resistance to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks is weak. Taking this into account, we propose two new variants of EDHOC. The first variant, EDHOC2, is able to overcome both issues but has a slightly higher cost for communication, computation, storage, and energy consumption. The second variant, EDHOC3, offers only additional protection in the eCK security model and has, on average, similar, even better performance in one authentication mode, compared to EDHOC. Additionally, the Real-Or-Random (ROR) logic and Scyther validation tool are employed to ensure the security of the designed variants. Furthermore, a prototype implementation is conducted to demonstrate the real-time deployment of the designed versions. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3690530 |
| Willie Kouam, Yezekael Hayel, Gabriel Deugoué, Charles Kamhoua | Decoy Allocation against Lateral Movement - A Network Centrality Game Approach | 2026 | Early Access | Circuits Feedback Network topology Reconnaissance Communication systems Radio access networks Regional area networks Routing Military communication Computer networks Lateral movement Cyber deception Centrality measure One-sided POSGs | Targeted incidents increasingly threaten internal security with a rise in data breaches and service disruptions. Attackers now employ sophisticated approaches, infiltrating systems for ongoing access to critical information through lateral movement. Detecting and defending against such intrusions is challenging due to commonly exploited specific vulnerabilities. Consequently, various deception techniques have emerged over time, aiming to divert attackers’ attention. In our scenario, attackers use lateral movement within the network to reach a specific target, while defenders strategically deploy decoys to counteract them. Such a dynamic and adversarial interaction is modeled as a one-sided partially observable stochastic game (OS-POSG). Several solutions have been proposed to address this challenge, particularly when the attacker possesses complete knowledge of the network’s topology through the recognition stage. Simultaneously, recent years saw the development of approaches to obscure the attackers’ reconnaissance phase, compelling them to operate without a full comprehension of the network’s structure. We therefore introduce an innovative methodology involving intelligent players who take into account the importance of network devices, assessed by centrality measures, during the decision-making process. This approach aims to improve the effectiveness of the defender’s strategy to counter the attacker’s lateral movement in the network, in the context of step-by-step optimization. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3689344 |
| Abdeltif Azzizi, Mohamad Al Adraa, Chadi Assi, Michael Y. Frankel, Vladimir Pelekhaty | Experimental Topological Analysis in Next-Generation Data Center Networks: STRAT and Clos Topologies | 2026 | Early Access | Telemetry Aerospace and electronic systems Payloads Optical waveguides Optical fibers Broadcasting Broadcast technology Application specific integrated circuits Circuits Feedback Data Center Topologies Clos Topology STRAT Topology Scalability Challenges Network Architecture Performance Evaluation | This paper presents an experimental and simulationbased evaluation of two data center network (DCN) topologies: the widely adopted hierarchical Clos architecture and STRAT, a flat, expander-based topology designed around passive optical interconnects. While Clos offers proven scalability and performance, it incurs hardware complexity and suffers from congestion in oversubscribed scenarios. STRAT eliminates aggregation and spine layers entirely—using only Top-of-Rack (ToR) switches interconnected via static optical patch panels—to reduce cost, simplify deployment, and enhance path diversity. Our goal is to assess these topologies based on their inherent architectural properties—namely throughput, congestion resilience, scalability, and cost—without relying on congestion control protocols or centralized traffic engineering. To this end, we adopt simple forwarding schemes based purely on local information: ECMP for Clos, and ECMP with Dynamic Group Multipath (DGM) for STRAT. We evaluate both topologies on a physical testbed built from commercial Ethernet switches and further validate scalability through packet-level simulations of networks with up to 256 switches and 1,024 hosts using OMNeT++. We also introduce DEALER, a lightweight routing algorithm tailored to STRAT’s topology, and evaluate its effectiveness in dynamic conditions. Our results show that STRAT achieves up to 43% higher throughput and requires approximately 40% fewer switches than a comparable Clos topology. These gains are further supported by Load Area Under Curve (LAUC) analysis and congestion hotspot visualizations. Overall, our study highlights STRAT as a compelling and practical alternative to conventional DCN architectures, offering deployable scalability, improved performance under load, and reduced infrastructure cost. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3685175 |
| Qin Zeng, Dan Qu, Hao Zhang, Yaqi Chen | Neural Collapse-Based Class-Incremental Learning for Encrypted Traffic Classification | 2026 | Early Access | Payloads Military aircraft Space technology Feeds Frequency modulation Radio broadcasting Filtering Filters Memory modules Virtual private networks Encrypted traffic classification Class incremental learning Neural collapse | The rapid evolution of internet technologies has intensified network traffic dynamics due to the emergence of novel encryption protocols, posing significant challenges to traffic classification. Incremental learning, which enables continuous adaptation to emerging tasks, has emerged as a promising approach to enhance the sustainability of encrypted traffic classification. However, existing methods fail to address the substantial feature representation disparities across incremental tasks, resulting in suboptimal model adaptability. Inspired by the Neural Collapse (NC) phenomenonwhich reveals that deep neural networks’ final-layer features collapse to class-mean vectors forming a Simplex Equiangular Tight Frame (ETF) with classifier weights, thereby constituting an optimal geometric structure for classification taskswe propose NCIL-ETC, a Neural Collapse-based Incremental Learning framework for Encrypted Traffic Classification. Our approach employs a pretrained Mamba as the feature extraction backbone, leveraging its linear-complexity computational properties to significantly reduce resource overhead. Simultaneously, we introduce a preallocated ETF classifier that establishes an optimal classification structure covering observed classes. Through feature-classifier alignment constraints during incremental learning, our method promotes both new and historical class features to converge toward ETF vertices, thereby preserving globally optimal category relationships. Extensive experimental evaluations on four public benchmarks demonstrate that NCIL-ETC achieves state-of-the-art performance, surpassing baseline methods in both classification accuracy and incremental learning capability. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3688767 |
| Deemah H. Tashman, Soumaya Cherkaoui | Trustworthy AI-Driven Dynamic Hybrid RIS: Joint Optimization and Reward Poisoning-Resilient Control in Cognitive MISO Networks | 2026 | Early Access | Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces Reliability Optimization Security MISO Array signal processing Vectors Satellites Reflection Interference Beamforming cascaded channels cognitive radio networks deep reinforcement learning dynamic hybrid reconfigurable intelligent surfaces energy harvesting poisoning attacks | Cognitive radio networks (CRNs) are a key mechanism for alleviating spectrum scarcity by enabling secondary users (SUs) to opportunistically access licensed frequency bands without harmful interference to primary users (PUs). To address unreliable direct SU links and energy constraints common in next-generation wireless networks, this work introduces an adaptive, energy-aware hybrid reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) for underlay multiple-input single-output (MISO) CRNs. Distinct from prior approaches relying on static RIS architectures, our proposed RIS dynamically alternates between passive and active operation modes in real time according to harvested energy availability. We also model our scenario under practical hardware impairments and cascaded fading channels. We formulate and solve a joint transmit beamforming and RIS phase optimization problem via the soft actor-critic (SAC) deep reinforcement learning (DRL) method, leveraging its robustness in continuous and highly dynamic environments. Notably, we conduct the first systematic study of reward poisoning attacks on DRL agents in RIS-enhanced CRNs, and propose a lightweight, real-time defense based on reward clipping and statistical anomaly filtering. Numerical results demonstrate that the SAC-based approach consistently outperforms established DRL base-lines, and that the dynamic hybrid RIS strikes a superior trade-off between throughput and energy consumption compared to fully passive and fully active alternatives. We further show the effectiveness of our defense in maintaining SU performance even under adversarial conditions. Our results advance the practical and secure deployment of RIS-assisted CRNs, and highlight crucial design insights for energy-constrained wireless systems. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3660728 |
| Qian Guo, Chunyu Zhang, Xue Xiao, Min Zhang, Zhuo Liu, Danshi Wang | Knowledge-Distilled Time-Series LLM for General Performance Parameter Prediction in Optical Transport Networks | 2026 | Early Access | Optical fibers Optical waveguides Feeds Network-on-chip Communication systems Internet of Things Optical fiber communication Optical fiber networks Telecommunications Quality of transmission Optical transport networks (OTNs) general performance parameter prediction time-series large language models knowledge distillation | In optical transport networks (OTNs), proactive and accurate prediction of key performance parameters plays a crucial role in identifying potential failure of OTN equipment and guiding timely operational interventions, reducing downtime and improving overall system performance. However, the performance parameters in OTNs are complex and diverse. The reliance of existing models structure design on specific configurations limits generalizability across diverse equipment types. Moreover, the high computational resource consumption and memory footprints of these models may lead to inefficiency while hindering practical application and large-scale deployment. To address these challenges, this paper presents a general model, KD-TimeLLM, a cross-application of TimeLLM into OTN failure management, for performance parameter prediction of multiple equipment types in OTNs. By learning from its teacher model TimeLLM via a knowledge distillation strategy, KD-TimeLLM can achieve generalizability in performance parameter prediction while enhancing efficiency. We conducted evaluations across multiple metrics using data sets from different operators and various board types. Results show that KD-TimeLLM outperforms other models in predictive effects including the lowest MSE and MAE across all types of board data along with a scaled_RMSE value below 0.5, the varying number of performance parameters, and zero-shot prediction capability, highlighting its generalizability. Moreover, compared to its teacher model, KD-TimeLLM achieves comparable predictive effects with a significant reduction 99.99% in model parameters and an average reduction of 99.23% in inference time across eight different types of board data. Furthermore, compared to a multiple-model system, total inference time and memory footprint of KD-TimeLLM decreased by 94.79% and 89.65%, highlighting its effectiveness and efficiency. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3686811 |
| Songshou Dong, Yanqing Yao, Huaxiong Wang, Yining Liu | LCMS: Efficient Lattice-based Conditional Privacy-preserving Multi-receiver Signcryption Scheme for Internet of Vehicles | 2026 | Early Access | Optical waveguides Optical fibers Broadcasting Broadcast technology Oscillators Circuits Feedback Circuits and systems Internet of Vehicles Communication systems Internet of Vehicles signcryption weak unlinkable certificateless revocable multi-receiver distributed decryption | Internet of Vehicles (IoV) requires robust security and privacy protection mechanisms to enable trusted traffic information exchange, while also requiring low communication and low computing overhead to meet the real-time requirements of IoV. Existing signcryption schemes suffer from quantum vulnerability, inadequate unlinkability/vehicle anonymity, absence of revocability, poor scalability, inadequate management of malicious entities, and high communication and computational overhead. So we propose an efficient lattice-based conditional privacy-preserving multi-receiver signcryption scheme (LCMS) that systematically addresses these gaps through three core innovations: 1) Privacy preservation is achieved via a pseudonym mechanism integrated with certificateless key generation, which ensures vehicle anonymity and weak unlinkability while preventing malicious key generation center and key escrow; 2) Malicious entity management through dynamic revocability and distributed decryption among roadside units, preventing unilateral message access; and 3) Post-quantum efficiency is achieved by leveraging the Learning With Rounding problem to eliminate expensive Gaussian sampling, combined with ciphertext packing techniques. This reduces time overhead, the size of signcryptexts, and communication overhead, while lowering the overall storage overhead of the scheme through the MP12 trapdoor. Security proofs show LCMS achieves Existential Unforgeability under Adaptive Identity Chosen-Message Attack and Indistinguishability under Adaptive Identity Chosen-Ciphertext Attack in the Random Oracle Model, with rigorously validated resistance against multiple IoV-specific attacks. Experimental results via SageMath implementation demonstrate that our scheme exhibits a smaller signcryptext size and lower signcryption/unsigncryption time compared to existing random lattice-based signcryption schemes. Scalability tests with 300 vehicles and 300 roadside units (RSUs) were completed within 230 seconds. Communication overhead analysis confirms practical feasibility for IEEE 802.11p vehicle communication protocol, and RSU serving capability evaluation under realistic vehicle density (100–200/km2) and speed (40–60 km/h) further validates system practicality. LCMS provides a quantum-resistant, privacy-preserving, and efficient solution for production IoV. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3688507 |
| Xinshuo Wang, Baihua Chen, Lei Liu, Yifei Li | Pisces: Fast Loss Recovery for Multipath Transmission in RDMA | 2026 | Early Access | Payloads Military aircraft Space technology Feeds System-on-chip Field programmable gate arrays Circuits Application specific integrated circuits Integrated circuits Feedback RDMA Loss Recovery Multipath Transmission Programmable Switch Programmable NIC FPGA | Conventional Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) relies on Priority Flow Control (PFC) to operate on lossless networks. However, as data centers scale, PFC’s drawbacks, such as head-of-line blocking and congestion spreading become increasingly problematic. This study proposes Pisces, a fast packet loss recovery scheme that leverages terminal–network collaboration. Instead of targeting lossless RDMA networks, Pisces enables high-throughput RDMA by efficiently handling loss recovery. To address the inefficient retransmission problems of PFC+Go-Back-N and the challenges of configuring appropriate timeouts for Selective Repeat (SR) in multipath transmission scenarios, Pisces implements Quick Drop Notification (QDN) of packet loss on switches, avoiding bandwidth waste and timeouts. In addition, Pisces RDMA NICs feature on-chip packet buffers to cache in-flight packets, supporting the scalability demands of RDMA in modern data centers. Upon receiving a QDN, lost packets are quickly retrieved from the buffer for retransmission, significantly improving retransmission efficiency and reducing PCIe bandwidth waste caused by cache replacements. This study overcame numerous challenges to implement Pisces prototype, which demonstrated excellent performance. Testbed experiments show that Pisces improves the 99th-percentile FCT by 130×compared to Mellanox CX-6. Large-scale simulations demonstrate that Pisces achieves a maximum reduction of 82.8% in the 99.9th-percentile FCT compared to SR and other state-of-the-art technologies. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3688038 |
| Shahid Mahmood, Moneeb Gohar, Seok Joo Koh | Globally Integrated Trust Authority (GITA) for Resource-Constrained Edge Devices in IoT and 6G | 2026 | Early Access | Payloads Filtering Central Processing Unit Filters Feedback Circuits Electronic circuits Microcontrollers Circuits and systems Microprocessors GITA Globally Integrated Trust Authority Network PKDL TSL LMS Security Trust Management Resource Constrained Edge Device Internet of Things and Cyber-Attack | The rapid growth of the Internet and the increasing number of edge devices have expanded the cyber-attack surface at the edge layer. Hackers exploit vulnerabilities at various levels of a network by either directly connecting to it or accessing it over the Internet. In both scenarios, edge devices remain a primary target due to their widespread use, limited resources and critical impact. Therefore, securing edge devices is essential to counter both local and global cyber threats. Trust is a key factor in determining the level of protection required for edge devices. It can be used to assess the reliability of other devices before offering or requesting services. Since edge devices are often globally interconnected, trust levels should be verifiable across the Internet and intranet. In this paper, we propose the Globally Integrated Trust Authority (GITA), a framework that distributes verifiable trust values across networks and the Internet while minimizing communication overhead. Experimental results demonstrate that GITA improves the efficiency of trust value distribution and verification among nodes compared to digital certificates, while maintaining the same level of protection.. This approach enables effective identification of malicious and benign nodes, enhancing the precision of malicious node detection locally and globally. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3687967 |
| Jing Zhang, Chao Luo, Rui Shao | MTG-GAN: A Masked Temporal Graph Generative Adversarial Network for Cross-Domain System Log Anomaly Detection | 2026 | Early Access | Anomaly detection Adaptation models Generative adversarial networks Feature extraction Data models Load modeling Accuracy Robustness Contrastive learning Chaos Log Anomaly Detection Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) Temporal Data Analysis | Anomaly detection of system logs is crucial for the service management of large-scale information systems. Nowadays, log anomaly detection faces two main challenges: 1) capturing evolving temporal dependencies between log events to adaptively tackle with emerging anomaly patterns, 2) and maintaining high detection capabilities across varies data distributions. Existing methods rely heavily on domain-specific data features, making it challenging to handle the heterogeneity and temporal dynamics of log data. This limitation restricts the deployment of anomaly detection systems in practical environments. In this article, a novel framework, Masked Temporal Graph Generative Adversarial Network (MTG-GAN), is proposed for both conventional and cross-domain log anomaly detection. The model enhances the detection capability for emerging abnormal patterns in system log data by introducing an adaptive masking mechanism that combines generative adversarial networks with graph contrastive learning. Additionally, MTG-GAN reduces dependency on specific data distribution and improves model generalization by using diffused graph adjacency information deriving from temporal relevance of event sequence, which can be conducive to improve cross-domain detection performance. Experimental results demonstrate that MTG-GAN outperforms existing methods on multiple real-world datasets in both conventional and cross-domain log anomaly detection. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3654642 |
| Ahmad Y. Alhusenat, Lei Lei, Jinjin Tian, Lihong Zhu, Tong-Xing Zheng, Symeon Chatzinotas | Dynamic Parallel Task Offloading and Sustainable On-Board Computing for Delay-Energy Optimization LEO Networks | 2026 | Vol. 23, Issue | Satellites Low earth orbit satellites Delays Optimization Satellite broadcasting Energy harvesting Space vehicles Resource management Real-time systems Orbits On-board computing parallel offloading energy management Lyapunov optimization LEO satellites | Task offloading among low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites with on-board computing (OBC) is important for real-time applications. However, OBC is constrained by the battery capacity of LEO, which fluctuates with orbital dynamics and available solar power. This paper addresses the problem of energy sustainability and timeliness in LEO-OBC systems by proposing a sustainable OBC-LEO framework that combines parallel offloading strategies with dynamic energy management. This problem is formulated as a Markov decision process aiming to minimize the overall delay while satisfying the LEO satellite energy constraints and achieving a high task success rate. To balance immediate computational demands and long-term energy stability, a Lyapunov optimization-based dynamic parallel offloading (LODPO) algorithm is designed to make decisions dynamically within each time slot, integrated with subtask allocation based on a low-cost (SABLC) algorithm that dynamically adjusts task allocations. Finally, simulation results demonstrate that the LODPO framework achieves a significant reduction in execution delay, incurring only 34.0% of the delay cost of binary offloading. Most critically, it ensures exceptional reliability, with a task drop rate that is only 8.5% of that seen in binary offloading and 12.0% of that in the DQN-based approach. This ensures high responsiveness and dependability for mission-critical, delay-sensitive applications. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3665512 |
| Fernando Martinez-Lopez, Lesther Santana, Mohamed Rahouti, Abdellah Chehri, Shawqi Al-Maliki, Gwanggil Jeon | Learning in Multiple Spaces: Prototypical Few-Shot Learning With Metric Fusion for Next-Generation Network Security | 2026 | Vol. 23, Issue | Measurement Prototypes Extraterrestrial measurements Training Chebyshev approximation Metalearning Scalability Next generation networking Learning (artificial intelligence) Data models Few-shot learning network intrusion detection metric-based learning multi-space prototypical learning | As next-generation communication networks increasingly rely on AI-driven automation, ensuring robust and secure intrusion detection becomes critical, especially under limited labeled data. In this context, we introduce Multi-Space Prototypical Learning (MSPL), a few-shot intrusion detection framework that improves prototype-based classification by fusing complementary metric-induced spaces (Euclidean, Cosine, Chebyshev, and Wasserstein) via a constrained weighting mechanism. MSPL further enhances stability through Polyak-averaged prototype generation and balanced episodic training to mitigate class imbalance across diverse attack categories. In a few-shot setting with as few as 200 training samples, MSPL consistently outperforms single-metric baselines across three benchmarks: on CICEVSE Network2024, AUPRC improves from 0.3719 to 0.7324 and F1 increases from 0.4194 to 0.8502; on CICIDS2017, AUPRC improves from 0.4319 to 0.4799; and on CICIoV2024, AUPRC improves from 0.5881 to 0.6144. These results demonstrate that multi-space metric fusion yields more discriminative and robust representations for detecting rare and emerging attacks in intelligent network environments. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3665647 |
| Minxi Feng, Haotian Wu, Shahid Mumtaz, Jiaming Pei | Intent-Based Network in Online Resource Allocation With Machine-Learned Prediction | 2026 | Vol. 23, Issue | Resource management Internet of Things Uncertainty Semantics Prediction algorithms Real-time systems Predictive models Decision making Safety Robustness Intent-based network online resource allocation online algorithm | The development of Internet-of-Things (IoT) services demands intelligent and adaptive mechanisms for online resource allocation under dynamic and uncertain environments. Intent-Based Networking (IBN) has emerged as a promising paradigm to align system behavior with high-level user intents. However, realizing intent-aware allocation in real time remains challenging due to uncertain resource availability and incomplete future information. This paper presents a modular framework that integrates semantic intent parsing, machine-learned resource prediction, and robust online decision-making. We propose IBN-ONMP, an IBN-based online resource allocation algorithm that leverages machine-learned predictions and adapts safety margins based on feedback to ensure feasibility and performance under uncertainty. We formally define the problem, establish theoretical guarantees including regret and competitive ratio bounds, and validate the approach on real-world and simulated datasets. Experimental results demonstrate that IBN-ONMP achieves high utility and robust performance across varying prediction error levels, which is consistent with theoretical analysis. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3665018 |
| Siyang Xu, Ze Fan, Zijian Zhou, Qiuyu Lu, Biao Zhang, Yu Wang, Xin Song | Minimizing the Cost of UAV-Assisted Marine Mobile Edge Computing System Based on Deep Reinforcement Learning | 2026 | Vol. 23, Issue | Autonomous aerial vehicles Energy consumption Optimization Delays Costs Heuristic algorithms Signal to noise ratio Multi-access edge computing Quality of service Processor scheduling Deep reinforcement learning mobile edge computing computation offloading unmanned aerial vehicle unmanned surface vehicles | To enable compute-intensive and delay-sensitive maritime services, unmanned surface vessels (USVs) can offload tasks to mobile edge computing (MEC) servers mounted on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). However, jointly minimizing energy consumption and latency is challenging due to the strong coupling between communication, computation, and mobility under stringent quality-of-service (QoS) requirements. To capture this trade-off, we formulate a weighted energy–delay minimization problem that jointly optimizes one-to-one UAV–USV scheduling, task partitioning, and UAV trajectory. The resulting problem is particularly difficult due to a hybrid discrete–continuous decision space and strong temporal coupling under stringent feasibility constraints. To address this mixed-integer nonconvex optimization problem, we reformulate it as a Markov decision process (MDP) and develop a constraint-aware OU–TD3 algorithm that integrates differentiable scheduling relaxation, feasibility-aware action mapping, and adaptive OU–Gaussian mixed exploration for stable learning in high-dimensional continuous control. We further extend the formulation and solution to a cooperative multi-UAV MEC setting with signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR)-coupled interference and coordination constraints. Extensive simulations with statistical evaluation demonstrate stable convergence and up to 54.2% cost reduction over baseline schemes, while maintaining robustness under realistic maritime disturbances. | 10.1109/TNSM.2026.3664895 |