Assessing multi-hop interpersonal trust in online social networks (OSNs) is critical for many social network applications such as online marketing but challenging due to the difficulties of handling complex OSN topology, in existing models such as subjective logic, and the lack of effective validation methods. To address these challenges, we for the first time properly define trust propagation and combination in arbitrary OSN topologies by proposing 3VSL (Three-Valued Subjective Logic). The 3VSL distinguishes the posteriori and priori uncertainties existing in trust, and the difference between distorting and original opinions, thus be able to compute multi-hop trusts in arbitrary graphs. We theoretically proved the capability based on the Dirichlet distribution. Furthermore, an online survey system is implemented to collect interpersonal trust data and validate the correctness and accuracy of 3VSL in real world. Both experimental and numerical results show that 3VSL is accurate in computing interpersonal trust in OSNs.
Assessing trust in online social networks (OSNs) is critical for many applications such as online marketing and network security. It is a challenging problem, however, due to the difficulties of handling complex social network topologies and conducting accurate assessment in these topologies. To address these challenges, we model trust by proposing the three-valued subjective logic (3VSL) model. 3VSL properly models the uncertainties that exist in trust, thus is able to compute trust in arbitrary graphs. We theoretically prove the capability of 3VSL based on the Dirichlet-Categorical (DC) distribution and its correctness in arbitrary OSN topologies. Based on the 3VSL model, we further design the AssessTrust (AT) algorithm to accurately compute the trust between any two users connected in an OSN. We validate 3VSL against two real-world OSN datasets: Advogato and Pretty Good Privacy (PGP). Experimental results indicate that 3VSL can accurately model the trust between any pair of indirectly connected users in the Advogato and PGP.
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