Efficient detection of relay node

Abstract

Whether or not a node is a relay node may be determined by, for each of a plurality of active flows, assigning a random number to the flow, wherein each of the random numbers is drawn from a distribution. Then, for each of a plurality of time slots, any incoming flows to the node and any outgoing flows from the node may be determined, random numbers assigned to any active flow of the incoming flows may be summed to generate a first sum, random numbers assigned to any active outgoing flows may be summed to generating a second sum, and the first sum may be multiplied with the second sum to generate a product associated with the time slot. The products over the plurality of time slots may then be summed to obtain a summed product. This may be repeated, reassigning random values to each of the plurality of flows, thereby obtaining a plurality of summed products. A variance of the plurality of summed products may be determined and compared with a threshold to obtain a comparison result. Whether or not the node is a relay node may then be determined using the comparison result. Execution of a relay node protection policy may be controlled using the determination of whether or not the node is a relay node.