Broken Signals in Security Games: Coordinating Patrollers and Sensors in the Real World

Mobile sensors, e.g., unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), are becoming increasingly important in security domains and can be used for tasks such as searching for poachers in conservation areas. Such mobile sensors augment human patrollers by assisting in surveillance and in signaling potentially deceptive information to adversaries, and their coordinated deployment could be modeled via the well-known security games framework. Unfortunately, real-world uncertainty in the sensor's detection of adversaries and adversaries' observation of the sensor's signals present major challenges in the sensors' use. This leads to significant detriments in security performance. We first discuss the current shortcomings in more detail, and then propose a novel game model that incorporates uncertainty with sensors. The defender strategy in this game model will consist of three interdependent stages: an allocation stage, a signaling stage, and a reaction stage.