Trust in Multi-Vehicle Systems Using MDP Control Strategies

This paper proposes a protocol that ensures trust between two vehicles in a multi-vehicle system. Trust is the implicit assessment that another vehicle will follow a predetermined strategy. The communication is done through a channel and the quantity of information transferred is guaranteed to be small. For privacy, the channel can be encrypted, but the message can only be decoded if the vehicles know the control strategy being followed. The protocol is implemented for a problem of two Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) trying to find a target in a maze. The control strategy is implemented using Markov Decision Processes (MDPs). Simulations of the protocol demonstrate that communication is received and decoded by the teammates without explicitly revealing the tactics being used.