Efficient Strategy-Proof Multicast in Selfish Wireless Networks

In this chapter, we study how to perform routing when each wireless node is selfish, i.e., a wireless node will always maximize its own benefit. Traditionally, it is assumed by the majority of the routing protocols for wireless networks that each wireless node will forward the packets for other nodes if it is asked to do so. However, this assumption may not be true in practice, especially when the wireless devices are owned by individual users. A node will deviate from a routing protocol if it will gain more benefit by doing so. In this chapter, we assume that each wireless node will incur a cost when it forwards a unit of data for some other nodes. A node will forward the data only if it gets a payment to compensate its cost. Its profit (or called utility) will then be the payment minus its cost if it did forward the data. For a multicast with a source node and a set of receiver nodes, we assume that they will pay the relay nodes to carry the traffic from the source to receivers. We assume that the cost of each agent is private and each agent can manipulate its reported cost to maximize its utility. A payment scheme is strategyproof if every agent maximizes its utility when it reports its cost truthfully. In this chapter, we propose several strategyproof mechanisms for multicast for selfish wireless networks when each node has a cost of forwarding a unit data based on various structures. We prove that each of our payment schemes is optimum for the corresponding structure used.