2017/12/12 by Divya Sindhu Lekha, Lekha, Divya Sindhu, Kannan Balakrishnan +1
Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #05C12 #05C82 #34K30 #35K57 #35Q80 #68R10 #92D25 #Complex Network Analysis Techniques #Discrete Mathematics (cs.DM) #FOS: Computer and information sciences #FOS: Physical sciences #Network Security and Intrusion Detection #Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence #Physics and Society (physics.soc-ph) #Social and Information Networks (cs.SI)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1712.04107
openalex publication_date 2017/12/12 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Central nodes are critical in establishing structural connectivity in a complex network. Attacking such nodes can create real havoc in a complex system. We propose attack strategies based on four types of centers, namely betweenness center, degree center, median, and center. We study the vulnerability of synthetic as well as real-world networks in these center-based attacks. These attacks are node-removal attacks which involve identifying the central node set and removing them from the network. We observed that the attacks based on recalculated network information are more efficient than ones based on initial network information. This work shows that the median-based attack, which is a novel strategy proposed in this work, is highly destructive in real as well as synthetic networks.