Trust management in distributed databases

Abstract

Businesses and the military must be able to incorporate information from a number of sources in different formats to remain competitive. As the need for information increases, more applications are utilizing distributed databases. Data is collected from multiple sources in multiple formats and is combined into data warehouses or datamarts. For example, military applications are incorporating distributed databases to combine sensor information for use in command and control. Intelligent agents can already search the web for information sources. However, issues of interconnectivity among the agents and information sources, data overflow, data validity, and security remain to be addressed. This article addresses the security and data validity issues. Specifically, the article addresses trust management and its application to obtaining information utilizing an inherently untrustworthy medium. © 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.