Divide and Conquer: Leveraging Topology in Control of Epidemic Information Dynamics

As online social networks grow in both size and connectivity, epidemic information dynamics in such networks is attracting considerable research interests, due to its impact on both the network and individuals. This paper studies control of malicious information (virus) epidemic with replicable antidote information, taking topological characteristics of the underlying graph into consideration. Specifically, we analytically relate the extinction time of the virus to the diameter and giant component size of the remaining graph after the initial antidote distribution. With this divide and conquer guideline, topology-based antidote distribution approaches are designed, and then examined through simulations in real world network portions.