Moving target defense meets artificial-intelligence-driven network: A comprehensive survey

Publication Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

5-2025

Abstract

Based on emerging artificial intelligence (AI) tasks, cloud-edge–terminal architecture can provide powerful computing, intelligent interconnection, and real-time response, which can also be regarded as AI-driven network. Unfortunately, multiple network layers in the AI-driven network usually face various types of network threats, such as malicious network reconnaissance, side-channel attacks, and distributed denial of service (DDoS). Traditional security solutions respond to network threats after the occurrence of attacks. To solve this problem, the concept of moving target defense (MTD) has been proposed as a proactive defense mechanism that aims to defend against cyber attacks before they occur. In this article, we first provide a thorough analysis of the threats in the cloud-edge–terminal network. Then, we conduct a comprehensive survey to discuss the concept, design principles, and main classifications of MTD. Next, we further introduce the development potential in terms of AI-powered MTD on each network layer. Meanwhile, we also explore how MTD improves the security of AI algorithms. Lastly, we describe the existing challenges and research directions of MTD. The aim of this article is to provide an in-depth understanding for the readers on how to realize the integration between MTD and AI-driven network.

Keywords

Artificial intelligence (AI)-driven network, cloud-edge–terminal network, generative AI, moving target defense, security analysis

Discipline

Artificial Intelligence and Robotics | Information Security

Research Areas

Information Systems and Management

Publication

IEEE Internet of Things Journal

Volume

12

Issue

10

First Page

13384

Last Page

13397

ISSN

2327-4662

Identifier

10.1109/JIOT.2025.3533016

Publisher

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1109/JIOT.2025.3533016

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS