A reputation-based system model for P2P networks

Over the last few years, peer-to-peer or (P2P) networks have changed much the attitude of our online life. Entire users in such networks can play either provider or consumer role all the time. They can share numerous resources directly with each other, regardless of true identity of interacting participants. To join such networks securely, the reputation system becomes a critical part to evaluate the trust of participants. Unfortunately, among current P2P networks, the reputation data used in the reputation system is still limited and valid to only the same community where its referrers and raters belong. This is regarded as inflexibility, causing problems in many aspects. In this paper, we propose a model of P2P reputation system whose main concept is to create a separate P2P community called reputation community, which keeps the reputation data of various object types of other communities. By this concept, we show how it helps the reputation system gets more flexible, scalable, and secure.