The Cyber Alliance Game: How Alliances Influence Cyber-Warfare

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Benkő, Gergely, Biczók, Gergely
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866914967963303936
author Benkő, Gergely
Biczók, Gergely
author_facet Benkő, Gergely
Biczók, Gergely
contents Cyber-warfare has become the norm in current ongoing military conflicts. Over the past decade, numerous examples have shown the extent to which nation-states become vulnerable if they do not focus on building their cyber capacities. Adding to the inherent complexity of cyberwar scenarios, a state is usually a member of one or more alliances. Alliance policies and internal struggles could shape the individual actions of member states; intuitively, this also holds for the cyber domain. In this paper, we define and study a simple Cyber Alliance Game with the objective of understanding the fundamental influence of alliances on cyber conflicts between nation-states. Specifically, we focus on the decision of whether to exploit a newly found vulnerability individually or share it with the alliance. First, we characterize the impact of vulnerability-sharing rewards on the resulting equilibrium. Second, we study the implications of the internal power structure of alliances on cyberwar outcomes and infer the expected behavior of Dictator, Veto, and Dummy players. Finally, we investigate how alliances can nudge their members via rewards and punishments to adhere to their defensive or offensive cyber policy. We believe that our results contribute to the fundamental understanding of real-world cyber-conflicts by characterizing the impact of alliances.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2410_05953
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle The Cyber Alliance Game: How Alliances Influence Cyber-Warfare
Benkő, Gergely
Biczók, Gergely
Computer Science and Game Theory
Cryptography and Security
Cyber-warfare has become the norm in current ongoing military conflicts. Over the past decade, numerous examples have shown the extent to which nation-states become vulnerable if they do not focus on building their cyber capacities. Adding to the inherent complexity of cyberwar scenarios, a state is usually a member of one or more alliances. Alliance policies and internal struggles could shape the individual actions of member states; intuitively, this also holds for the cyber domain. In this paper, we define and study a simple Cyber Alliance Game with the objective of understanding the fundamental influence of alliances on cyber conflicts between nation-states. Specifically, we focus on the decision of whether to exploit a newly found vulnerability individually or share it with the alliance. First, we characterize the impact of vulnerability-sharing rewards on the resulting equilibrium. Second, we study the implications of the internal power structure of alliances on cyberwar outcomes and infer the expected behavior of Dictator, Veto, and Dummy players. Finally, we investigate how alliances can nudge their members via rewards and punishments to adhere to their defensive or offensive cyber policy. We believe that our results contribute to the fundamental understanding of real-world cyber-conflicts by characterizing the impact of alliances.
title The Cyber Alliance Game: How Alliances Influence Cyber-Warfare
topic Computer Science and Game Theory
Cryptography and Security
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.05953