Agent-Based Trust Management for Trust Re-Evaluation in Online Auctions

(NSF Award Number: CNS-0715648)


PI: Haiping Xu
Concurrent Software Engineering Laboratory (CSEL)
Computer and Information Science Department
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

August 1, 2007


Abstract


Electronic commerce plays an important role in the US economy. However, current electronic commerce applications such as online auction systems are not trustworthy due to a lack of effective trust management mechanisms. A trustworthy online auction system requires a dynamic trust management system that can detect abnormal bidding activities in real-time, notify the involved users, and cancel the corresponding auction immediately.

This project investigates an agent-based approach for dynamic trust management in online auctions. The approach supports real-time monitoring, analyzing, and detection of abnormal bidding behaviors in online auction systems so the trustworthiness of such systems can be ensured. Specific problems to be addressed in this project include 1) investigating efficient formal methods, such as model checking techniques, for analysis of real-time auction data; 2) defining a real-time trust model that supports trust re-evaluation; and 3) formulating intelligent agents that support reasoning with uncertainty and incomplete information. The research activities will result in a loosely coupled agent-based trust management (ATM) module in online auction systems. The project will have favorable broader impacts on trustworthy computing research, education, as well as industrial applications. The results from this project can help to develop trustworthy systems in electronic commerce, and will contribute to boost the US economy by providing a safe and trusted environment for Internet-based trading.

 

Collaborators (UIC)

(NSF Award Number: CNS-0715657)

  • PI: Sol M. Shatz, Professor, University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC)
  • PhD Student (UIC): Fei Dong

 

Graduate Students (UMassD)


 Former Students
  • Benjamin J. Ford (2010): Data mining approaches for detection of suspicious bidders in online auctions
  • John Rahme: Collection of online auction data using smart web crawlers
  • Ashok Peeta: Feature selection and clustering of online auction data
  • Ankit Goel (2010): A multi-state Bayesian network for shill verification in online auctions
  • Benjamin J. Ford (2009): Visual specification of layered bidding strategies for autonomous bidding agents
  • Naga S. Kandala (2009): Web based adaptive bidding agent with layered bidding strategies
  • Christopher K. Bates (2009): Agent-based real-time shill detection in electronic auctions
  • Ankit Goel (2008): Evaluation of a Bayesian network with multi-state nodes for shill verification in online auctions
  • Christopher K. Bates (2007): Rule-based specification of flexible bidding strategies in agent-based online auctions
  • Rinkesh Patel (2006): Real-time trust management in online auctions
  • Yi-Tsung Cheng (2005): Detection of shilling behaviors in online auctions
  • Jose Manuel Valladares (2004): multi-agent system for electronic auctions

 

Publications

  1. Benjamin J. Ford, Haiping Xu, and Iren Valova, "A Real-Time Self-Adaptive Classifier for Identifying Suspicious Bidders in Online Auctions," To appear in The Computer Journal (COMPJ), 2012.
  2. Fei Dong, Sol M. Shatz, Haiping Xu, and Dibyen Majumdar, "Price Comparison: A Reliable Approach to Identifying Shill Bidding in Online Auctions?," To appear in Electronic Commerce Research and Applications (ECRA), 2012.
  3. Benjamin J. Ford, Haiping Xu, and Iren Valova, "Identifying Suspicious Bidders Utilizing Hierarchical Clustering and Decision Trees," In Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ICAI'10), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 2010, pp. 195-201.
  4. Ankit Goel, Haiping Xu, and Sol M. Shatz, "A Multi-State Bayesian Network for Shill Verification in Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE'2010), Redwood City, San Francisco Bay, USA, July 2010, pp. 279-285.
  5. Fei Dong, Sol M. Shatz, and Haiping Xu, "An Empirical Evaluation on the Relationship Between Final Auction Price and Shilling Activity in Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE'2010), Redwood City, San Francisco Bay, USA, July 2010, pp. 286-291.
  6. Benjamin J. Ford, Haiping Xu, Christopher K. Bates, and Sol M. Shatz, "Visual Specification of Layered Bidding Strategies for Autonomous Bidding Agents," Journal of Computers (JCP), Vol. 5, No. 6, June 2010, pp. 940-950.
  7. Fei Dong, Sol M. Shatz, and Haiping Xu, "Reasoning Under Uncertainty for Shill Detection in Online Auctions Using Dempster-Shafer Theory," To appear in International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (IJSEKE), 2010.
  8. Haiping Xu, Christopher K. Bates, and Sol M. Shatz, "Real-Time Model Checking for Shill Detection in Live Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the International Conference on Software Engineering Research and Practice (SERP'09), July 13-16, 2009, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, pp. 134-140.
  9. Fei Dong, Sol M. Shatz, and Haiping Xu, "Combating Online In-Auction Fraud: Clues, Techniques and Challenges," Computer Science Review (CSR), Vol. 3, No. 4, November 2009, pp. 245-258.
  10. Benjamin J. Ford, Haiping Xu, Christopher K. Bates, and Sol M. Shatz, "Model-Based Specification of Flexible and Complex Bidding Strategies in Agent-Based Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2009), April 27-29, 2009, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, pp. 894-900.
  11. Fei Dong, Sol M. Shatz, and Haiping Xu, "Inference of Online Auction Shills Using Dempster-Shafer Theory," In Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2009), April 27-29, 2009, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, pp. 908-914.
  12. Haiping Xu, Sol M. Shatz, and Christopher K. Bates, "A Framework for Agent-Based Trust Management in Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2008), April 7-9, 2008, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, pp. 149-155.
  13. Haiping Xu and Yi-Tsung Cheng, "Model Checking Bidding Behaviors in Internet Concurrent Auctions," International Journal of Computer Systems Science & Engineering (IJCSSE), July 2007, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 179-191.
  14. Rinkesh Patel, Haiping Xu, and Ankit Goel, "Real-Time Trust Management in Agent Based Online Auction Systems," In Proceedings of the Nineteenth International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE'07), Boston, USA, July 9-11, 2007, pp. 244-250.
  15. Yi-Tsung Cheng and Haiping Xu, "A Formal Approach to Detecting Shilling Behaviors in Concurrent Online Auctions," In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS 2006), May 23-27, 2006, Paphos, Cyprus, pp. 375-381.

Trustworthy Agent-Based Online Auction Systems - A Brief Introduction
Poster for Cyber Trust 2008

 

Papers in Preparation

  1. Haiping Xu, Christopher K. Bates, and Sol M. Shatz, "An Efficient Shill Detection Approach in Live Online Auctions Using Real-Time Model Checking," Computer and Information Science Department, UMass Dartmouth, 2010.

 

Software and Information Resources

  1. Prototype Agent-based Trust Management module (Download) (Readme.txt)
  2. Sample auction data collected from eBay (DataSet-1, DataSet-2)
  3. Sample auction date generated by bidding agents (BidData)

 

Related Professional Activities

  • Session Chair: International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE 2010), Redwood City, San Francisco Bay, USA, July 2010.
  • Talk: A Multi-State Bayesian Network for Shill Verification in Online Auctions, International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE 2010), Redwood City, San Francisco Bay, USA, July 2010 (Slides).
  • Talk: Identifying Suspicious Bidders Utilizing Hierarchical Clustering and Decision Trees, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), International Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ICAI'10), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 2010 (Slides).
  • Thesis Committee Member for Ph.D. preliminary exam by Fei Dong, University of Illinois at Chicago, Tuesday, June 1, 2010 (2-3:30pm) in 1000 SEO.
  • Demo: Visual Specification of Layered Bidding Strategies for Autonomous Bidding Agents, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), Discovery Day, Experience UMass Dartmouth Days, Saturday, March 27, 2010.
  • Track Committee: 7th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2010), E-Commerce Track, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2010.
  • Talk: Trustworthy Agent‐Based Online Auction Systems, Computer Science Seminar Series, Computer and Information Science Department, UMass Dartmouth, November 2009.
  • Demo: Specification of Bidding Strategies for Agent-Based Online Auctions, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), Open House for COE, College of Engineering (COE), UMass Dartmouth, Saturday, October 24, 2009.
  • Demo: Specification of Bidding Strategies for Agent-Based Online Auctions, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), High School Visit: Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High School, UMass Dartmouth, Thursday, October 29, 2009.
  • Session Chair: International Conference on Software Engineering Research and Practice (SERP'09), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 2009.
  • Talk: Real-Time Model Checking for Shill Detection in Live Online Auctions, International Conference on Software Engineering Research and Practice (SERP'09), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 2009 (Slides).
  • NSF Project Phone Conference: Certification of Shill Bidding Behavior in Online Auction Systems, Participants: Haiping Xu, Sol M. Shatz, and Fei Dong (student), May 26, 2009.
  • Demo: Model-Based Specification of Complex Bidding Strategies in Agent-Based Online Auctions, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), Computer Science Industrial Advisory Committee (CSIAC) Meeting, UMass Dartmouth, USA, May 8, 2009.
  • Session Chair: 6th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2009), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2009.
  • Talk: Model-Based Specification of Complex Bidding Strategies in Agent-Based Online Auctions, 6th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2009), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2009 (Slides).
  • Demo: Specification of Bidding Strategies for Agent-Based Online Auctions, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), Open House for COE Undeclared Freshmen and Sophomores, College of Engineering (COE), UMass Dartmouth, Tuesday, April 14, 2009.
  • Demo: Specification of Bidding Strategies for Agent-Based Online Auctions, Presentor: Benjamin Ford (student), UMD 101 for Discovery Day, UMass Dartmouth, Friday, March 27, 2009.
  • NSF Project Phone Conference: Inference of Online Auction Shills Using Dempster-Shafer Theory, Participants: Haiping Xu, Sol M. Shatz, and Fei Dong (student), March 18, 2009.
  • Talk: Trustworthy Agent-Based Online Auction Systems, Computer Science Seminar Series, UMass Dartmouth, USA, March 13, 2009 (postponed).
  • Session Organizer: A Special Session on Agent-Based Systems: Research and Practice, The 2009 International Conference on Software Engineering Research and Practice (SERP'09), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, July 2009.
  • Track Committee: 6th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2009), E-Commerce Track, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2009.
  • Talk: A Framework for Agent-Based Trust Management in Online Auctions, 5th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2008), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 7, 2008 (Slides).
  • Session Chair: 5th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2008), Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2008.
  • NSF Cyber Trust PI meeting (Cyber Trust 2008), Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA, March 16-18, 2008 (Poster). (CT 2007)
  • NSF Project meeting, University of Illinois at Chicago, Illinois, USA, January 14-16, 2008.
  • Talk: Trustworthy Agent-Based Online Auction Systems, Computer Science Industrial Advisory Committee (CSIAC) Meeting, UMass Dartmouth, USA, November 9, 2007.
  • Track Committee: 5th International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations (ITNG 2008), E-Commerce Track, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, April 2008.
  • Talk: Real-Time Trust Management in Agent Based Online Auction Systems, 19th International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering (SEKE'07), Boston, USA, July 9, 2007.
  • PhD Thesis Commitee: Privacy and Security in Online Auctions, by Jarrod Trevathan, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, James Cook University, Australia, 2007. Thesis Advisor: Professor Wayne Read.

 

Acknowledgment and Disclaimer

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. CNS-0715648 and CNS-0715657. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recomendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation (NSF).

 


© Copyright 2007, CIS Department, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

Send Email To: hxu@umassd.edu