Title: A purpose-based synchronisation protocol of multiple transactions in multi-agent systems

Authors: Tomoya Enokido, Makoto Takizawa

Addresses: Faculty of Business Administration, Rissho University, 4-2-16 Osaki, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo 141-8602, Japan. ' Department of Computer and Information Science, Seikei University, 3-3-1 Kichijoji-Kitamachi, Musashino, Tokyo 180-8633, Japan

Abstract: Multiple agents cooperate with each other through manipulating objects. A transaction is a unit of work issued by an agent. A transaction is assigned with a purpose which is a subfamily of roles granted to the agent. Even if transactions issue methods according to the purposes, illegal information flow might occur. We define legal, independent, illegal, and possibly illegal information flow relations among purposes. We discussed the purpose-based marking protocol to prevent illegal information flow. Then, we discussed the releasing mechanism of purpose marks to improve the throughput. Finally, we evaluated the Purpose-based Marking and Releasing (PMR) protocol.

Keywords: multi-agent systems; MAS; agent-based systems; role-based access control model; locking protocol; information flow; PMR; purpose-based marking protocol; purpose-based releasing protocol; security; multiple transactions; confinement problem; distributed systems; distributed objects; throughput; legal information flow; independent information flow; illegal information flow.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBIDM.2009.025413

International Journal of Business Intelligence and Data Mining, 2009 Vol.4 No.1, pp.99 - 117

Published online: 21 May 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article