Information-driven network resilience: Research challenges and perspectives

Abstract Internet designed over 40 years ago was originally focused on host-to-host message delivery in a best-effort manner. However, introduction of new applications over the years have brought about new requirements related with throughput, scalability, mobility, security, connectivity, and availability among others. Additionally, convergence of telecommunications, media, and information technology was responsible for transformation of the Internet into an integrated system enabling accessing, distributing, processing, storing, and managing the payload of these messages. Users are now visibly more interested in receiving / accessing information independently of the network location of its host. This consideration in turn revived the interest in named data-driven networking (a.k.a. Information-Centric Networking- ICN). Instead of assuming that networks are limited to the manipulation of network locator space, the basic assumption underneath is that information can be named, addressed, and matched independently of its network location leaving in turn the possibility to match message delivery delay requirements. In this paper, we summarize our research conducted in order to bring a completely different view / perspective of network resilience, originally defined as the ability of a network to assure an acceptable level of service in the face of various faults and challenges to normal operation. That is, instead of maintaining network reachability independently of its actual utility to the “end-points”, our research aimed at exchanging and confronting the key principles that would enable an information-driven resilience (networked) scheme. More precisely, knowing that the user utility function is mainly driven nowadays by information-related criteria such as accessibility (reachability), how to design network resilience schemes that would be directed toward that goal. The main challenge is thus: can one design resilience schemes that combine maximization of end-point utility function and minimization of the network-related cost?