Identifying influential spreaders in social networks: A two-stage quantum-behaved particle swarm optimization with Lévy flight

The influence maximization problem aims to select a small set of influential nodes, termed a seed set, to maximize their influence coverage in social networks. Although the methods that are based on a greedy strategy can obtain good accuracy, they come at the cost of enormous computational time, and are therefore not applicable to practical scenarios in large-scale networks. In addition, the centrality heuristic algorithms that are based on network topology can be completed in relatively less time. However, they tend to fail to achieve satisfactory results because of drawbacks such as overlapped influence spread. In this work, we propose a discrete two-stage metaheuristic optimization combining quantum-behaved particle swarm optimization with Lévy flight to identify a set of the most influential spreaders. According to the framework,first, the particles in the population are tasked to conduct an exploration in the global solution space to eventually converge to an acceptable solution through the crossover and replacement operations. Second, the Lévy flight mechanism is used to perform a wandering walk on the optimal candidate solution in the population to exploit the potentially unidentified influential nodes in the network. Experiments on six real-world social networks show that the proposed algorithm achieves more satisfactory results when compared to other well-known algorithms.

CRB:A new rumor blocking algorithm in online social networks based on competitive spreading model and influence maximization

The virtuality and openness of online social platforms make networks a hotbed for the rapid propagation of various rumors.In order to block the outbreak of rumor,one of the most effective containment measures is spreading positive information to counterbalance the diffusion of rumor.The spreading mechanism of rumors and effective suppression strategies are significant and challenging research issues.Firstly,in order to simulate the dissemination of multiple types of information,we propose a competitive linear threshold model with state transition(CLTST)to describe the spreading process of rumor and anti-rumor in the same network.Subsequently,we put forward a community-based rumor blocking(CRB)algorithm based on influence maximization theory in social networks.Its crucial step is to identify a set of influential seeds that propagate anti-rumor information to other nodes,which includes community detection,selection of candidate anti-rumor seeds and generation of anti-rumor seed set.Under the CLTST model,the CRB algorithm has been compared with six state-of-the-art algorithms on nine online social networks to verify the performance.Experimental results show that the proposed model can better reflect the process of rumor propagation,and review the propagation mechanism of rumor and anti-rumor in online social networks.Moreover,the proposed CRB algorithm has better performance in weakening the rumor dissemination ability,which can select anti-rumor seeds in networks more accurately and achieve better performance in influence spread,sensitivity analysis,seeds distribution and running time.

Deep Learning Social Network Access Control Model Based on User Preferences

A deep learning access controlmodel based on user preferences is proposed to address the issue of personal privacy leakage in social networks.Firstly,socialusers andsocialdata entities are extractedfromthe social networkandused to construct homogeneous and heterogeneous graphs.Secondly,a graph neural networkmodel is designed based on user daily social behavior and daily social data to simulate the dissemination and changes of user social preferences and user personal preferences in the social network.Then,high-order neighbor nodes,hidden neighbor nodes,displayed neighbor nodes,and social data nodes are used to update user nodes to expand the depth and breadth of user preferences.Finally,a multi-layer attention network is used to classify user nodes in the homogeneous graph into two classes:allow access and deny access.The fine-grained access control problem in social networks is transformed into a node classification problem in a graph neural network.The model is validated using a dataset and compared with other methods without losing generality.The model improved accuracy by 2.18%compared to the baseline method GraphSAGE,and improved F1 score by 1.45%compared to the baseline method,verifying the effectiveness of the model.

A Privacy Preservation Method for Attributed Social Network Based on Negative Representation of Information

Due to the presence of a large amount of personal sensitive information in social networks,privacy preservation issues in social networks have attracted the attention of many scholars.Inspired by the self-nonself discrimination paradigmin the biological immune system,the negative representation of information indicates features such as simplicity and efficiency,which is very suitable for preserving social network privacy.Therefore,we suggest a method to preserve the topology privacy and node attribute privacy of attribute social networks,called AttNetNRI.Specifically,a negative survey-based method is developed to disturb the relationship between nodes in the social network so that the topology structure can be kept private.Moreover,a negative database-based method is proposed to hide node attributes,so that the privacy of node attributes can be preserved while supporting the similarity estimation between different node attributes,which is crucial to the analysis of social networks.To evaluate the performance of the AttNetNRI,empirical studies have been conducted on various attribute social networks and compared with several state-of-the-art methods tailored to preserve the privacy of social networks.The experimental results show the superiority of the developed method in preserving the privacy of attribute social networks and demonstrate the effectiveness of the topology disturbing and attribute hiding parts.The experimental results show the superiority of the developed methods in preserving the privacy of attribute social networks and demonstrate the effectiveness of the topological interference and attribute-hiding components.

A Large-Scale Group Decision Making Model Based on Trust Relationship and Social Network Updating

With the development of big data and social computing,large-scale group decisionmaking(LGDM)is nowmerging with social networks.Using social network analysis(SNA),this study proposes an LGDM consensus model that considers the trust relationship among decisionmakers(DMs).In the process of consensusmeasurement:the social network is constructed according to the social relationship among DMs,and the Louvain method is introduced to classify social networks to form subgroups.In this study,the weights of each decision maker and each subgroup are computed by comprehensive network weights and trust weights.In the process of consensus improvement:A feedback mechanism with four identification and two direction rules is designed to guide the consensus of the improvement process.Based on the trust relationship among DMs,the preferences are modified,and the corresponding social network is updated to accelerate the consensus.Compared with the previous research,the proposedmodel not only allows the subgroups to be reconstructed and updated during the adjustment process,but also improves the accuracy of the adjustment by the feedbackmechanism.Finally,an example analysis is conducted to verify the effectiveness and flexibility of the proposed method.Moreover,compared with previous studies,the superiority of the proposed method in solving the LGDM problem is highlighted.

Predicting Users’ Latent Suicidal Risk in Social Media: An Ensemble Model Based on Social Network Relationships

Suicide has become a critical concern,necessitating the development of effective preventative strategies.Social media platforms offer a valuable resource for identifying signs of suicidal ideation.Despite progress in detecting suicidal ideation on social media,accurately identifying individuals who express suicidal thoughts less openly or infrequently poses a significant challenge.To tackle this,we have developed a dataset focused on Chinese suicide narratives from Weibo’s Tree Hole feature and introduced an ensemble model named Text Convolutional Neural Network based on Social Network relationships(TCNN-SN).This model enhances predictive performance by leveraging social network relationship features and applying correction factors within a weighted linear fusion framework.It is specifically designed to identify key individuals who can help uncover hidden suicidal users and clusters.Our model,assessed using the bespoke dataset and benchmarked against alternative classification approaches,demonstrates superior accuracy,F1-score and AUC metrics,achieving 88.57%,88.75%and 94.25%,respectively,outperforming traditional TextCNN models by 12.18%,10.84%and 10.85%.We assert that our methodology offers a significant advancement in the predictive identification of individuals at risk,thereby contributing to the prevention and reduction of suicide incidences.

Discrete Choice Analysis of Temporal Factors on Social Network Growth

Social networks like Facebook, X (Twitter), and LinkedIn provide an interaction and communication environment for users to generate and share content, allowing for the observation of social behaviours in the digital world. These networks can be viewed as a collection of nodes and edges, where users and their interactions are represented as nodes and the connections between them as edges. Understanding the factors that contribute to the formation of these edges is important for studying network structure and processes. This knowledge can be applied to various areas such as identifying communities, recommending friends, and targeting online advertisements. Several factors, including node popularity and friends-of-friends relationships, influence edge formation and network growth. This research focuses on the temporal activity of nodes and its impact on edge formation. Specifically, the study examines how the minimum age of friends-of-friends edges and the average age of all edges connected to potential target nodes influence the formation of network edges. Discrete choice analysis is used to analyse the combined effect of these temporal factors and other well-known attributes like node degree (i.e., the number of connections a node has) and network distance between nodes. The findings reveal that temporal properties have a similar impact as network proximity in predicting the creation of links. By incorporating temporal features into the models, the accuracy of link prediction can be further improved.

Habits on Social Networks at Workplace: A Survey of Motivations and Behaviour

This article explores the use of social networks by workers in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, with particular emphasis on a descriptive or quantitative analysis aimed at understanding motivations and methods of use. More than five hundred and fifty questionnaires were distributed, highlighting workers’ preferred digital channels and platforms. The results indicate that the majority use social media through their mobile phones, with WhatsApp being the most popular app, followed by Facebook and LinkedIn. The study reveals that workers use social media for entertainment purposes and to develop professional and social relationships, with 55% unable to live without social media at work for recreational activities. In addition, 35% spend on average 1 to 2 hours on social networks, mainly between 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. It also appears that 46% believe that social networks moderately improve their productivity. These findings can guide marketing strategies, training, technology development and government policies related to the use of social media in the workplace.

Venture Capital Syndication under Social Network Theory:Literature Review and Prospect

As an important channel for start-ups to obtain R&D funds and external knowledge and information resources,and as one of the key methods for investment institutions to leverage scale and synergy effects to enhance investment returns,venture capital syndication holds significant research value in the field of venture capital.This paper reviews the literature,summarizing the motivations behind the formation of joint investment networks,the conceptual characteristics of the three core theories of social network theory,and the empirical research on venture capital syndication within the framework of social network theory.It also highlights the existing research results,identifies gaps,and anticipates future research directions.

An Influence Maximization Algorithm Based on Improved K-Shell in Temporal Social Networks

Influence maximization of temporal social networks(IMT)is a problem that aims to find the most influential set of nodes in the temporal network so that their information can be the most widely spread.To solve the IMT problem,we propose an influence maximization algorithm based on an improved K-shell method,namely improved K-shell in temporal social networks(KT).The algorithm takes into account the global and local structures of temporal social networks.First,to obtain the kernel value Ks of each node,in the global scope,it layers the network according to the temporal characteristic of nodes by improving the K-shell method.Then,in the local scope,the calculation method of comprehensive degree is proposed to weigh the influence of nodes.Finally,the node with the highest comprehensive degree in each core layer is selected as the seed.However,the seed selection strategy of KT can easily lose some influential nodes.Thus,by optimizing the seed selection strategy,this paper proposes an efficient heuristic algorithm called improved K-shell in temporal social networks for influence maximization(KTIM).According to the hierarchical distribution of cores,the algorithm adds nodes near the central core to the candidate seed set.It then searches for seeds in the candidate seed set according to the comprehensive degree.Experiments showthatKTIMis close to the best performing improved method for influence maximization of temporal graph(IMIT)algorithm in terms of effectiveness,but runs at least an order of magnitude faster than it.Therefore,considering the effectiveness and efficiency simultaneously in temporal social networks,the KTIM algorithm works better than other baseline algorithms.

A Parallel Approach for Sentiment Analysis on Social Networks Using Spark

The public is increasingly using social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to express their views on a variety of topics.As a result,social media has emerged as the most effective and largest open source for obtaining public opinion.Single node computational methods are inefficient for sentiment analysis on such large datasets.Supercomputers or parallel or distributed proces-sing are two options for dealing with such large amounts of data.Most parallel programming frameworks,such as MPI(Message Processing Interface),are dif-ficult to use and scale in environments where supercomputers are expensive.Using the Apache Spark Parallel Model,this proposed work presents a scalable system for sentiment analysis on Twitter.A Spark-based Naive Bayes training technique is suggested for this purpose;unlike prior research,this algorithm does not need any disk access.Millions of tweets have been classified using the trained model.Experiments with various-sized clusters reveal that the suggested strategy is extremely scalable and cost-effective for larger data sets.It is nearly 12 times quicker than the Map Reduce-based model and nearly 21 times faster than the Naive Bayes Classifier in Apache Mahout.To evaluate the framework’s scalabil-ity,we gathered a large training corpus from Twitter.The accuracy of the classi-fier trained with this new dataset was more than 80%.

Improved Key Node Recognition Method of Social Network Based on PageRank Algorithm

The types and functions of social networking sites are becoming more abundant with the prevalence of self-media culture,and the number of daily active users of social networking sites represented by Weibo and Zhihu continues to expand.There are key node users in social networks.Compared with ordinary users,their influence is greater,their radiation range is wider,and their information transmission capabilities are better.The key node users playimportant roles in public opinion monitoring and hot event prediction when evaluating the criticality of nodes in social networking sites.In order to solve the problems of incomplete evaluation factors,poor recognition rate and low accuracy of key nodes of social networking sites,this paper establishes a social networking site key node recognition algorithm(SNSKNIS)based on PageRank(PR)algorithm,and evaluates the importance of social networking site nodes in combination with the influence of nodes and the structure of nodes in social networks.This article takes the Sina Weibo platform as an example,uses the key node identification algorithm system of social networking sites to discover the key nodes in the social network,analyzes its importance in the social network,and displays it visually.

Emerging Trends in Social Networking Systems and Generation Gap with Neutrosophic Crisp Soft Mapping

This paper aims to introduce the novel concept of neutrosophic crisp soft set(NCSS),including various types of neutrosophic crisp soft sets(NCSSs)and their fundamental operations.We define NCS-mapping and its inverse NCS-mapping between two NCS-classes.We develop a robust mathematical modeling with the help of NCS-mapping to analyze the emerging trends in social networking systems(SNSs)for our various generations.We investigate the advantages,disadvantages,and natural aspects of SNSs for five generations.With the changing of the generations,it is analyzed that emerging trends and the benefits of SNSs are increasing day by day.The suggested modeling with NCS-mapping is applicable in solving various decision-making problems.

Maximizing Influence in Temporal Social Networks:A Node Feature-Aware Voting Algorithm

Influence Maximization(IM)aims to select a seed set of size k in a social network so that information can be spread most widely under a specific information propagation model through this set of nodes.However,most existing studies on the IM problem focus on static social network features,while neglecting the features of temporal social networks.To bridge this gap,we focus on node features reflected by their historical interaction behavior in temporal social networks,i.e.,interaction attributes and self-similarity,and incorporate them into the influence maximization algorithm and information propagation model.Firstly,we propose a node feature-aware voting algorithm,called ISVoteRank,for seed nodes selection.Specifically,before voting,the algorithm sets the initial voting ability of nodes in a personalized manner by combining their features.During the voting process,voting weights are set based on the interaction strength between nodes,allowing nodes to vote at different extents and subsequently weakening their voting ability accordingly.The process concludes by selecting the top k nodes with the highest voting scores as seeds,avoiding the inefficiency of iterative seed selection in traditional voting-based algorithms.Secondly,we extend the Independent Cascade(IC)model and propose the Dynamic Independent Cascade(DIC)model,which aims to capture the dynamic features in the information propagation process by combining node features.Finally,experiments demonstrate that the ISVoteRank algorithm has been improved in both effectiveness and efficiency compared to baseline methods,and the influence spread through the DIC model is improved compared to the IC model.

Consensus model of social network group decision-making based on trust relationship among experts and expert reliability

Due to people’s increasing dependence on social networks,it is essential to develop a consensus model considering not only their own factors but also the interaction between people.Both external trust relationship among experts and the internal reliability of experts are important factors in decision-making.This paper focuses on improving the scientificity and effectiveness of decision-making and presents a consensus model combining trust relationship among experts and expert reliability in social network group decision-making(SN-GDM).A concept named matching degree is proposed to measure expert reliability.Meanwhile,linguistic information is applied to manage the imprecise and vague information.Matching degree is expressed by a 2-tuple linguistic model,and experts’preferences are measured by a probabilistic linguistic term set(PLTS).Subsequently,a hybrid weight is explored to weigh experts’importance in a group.Then a consensus measure is introduced and a feedback mechanism is developed to produce some personalized recommendations with higher group consensus.Finally,a comparative example is provided to prove the scientificity and effectiveness of the proposed consensus model.

Overlapping community‐based particle swarm optimization algorithm for influence maximization in social networks

Influence maximization,whose aim is to maximise the expected number of influenced nodes by selecting a seed set of k influential nodes from a social network,has many applications such as goods advertising and rumour suppression.Among the existing influence maximization methods,the community‐based ones can achieve a good balance between effectiveness and efficiency.However,this kind of algorithm usually utilise the network community structures by viewing each node as a non‐overlapping node.In fact,many nodes in social networks are overlapping ones,which play more important role in influence spreading.To this end,an overlapping community‐based particle swarm opti-mization algorithm named OCPSO for influence maximization in social networks,which can make full use of overlapping nodes,non‐overlapping nodes,and their interactive information is proposed.Specifically,an overlapping community detection algorithm is used to obtain the information of overlapping community structures,based on which three novel evolutionary strategies,such as initialisation,mutation,and local search are designed in OCPSO for better finding influential nodes.Experimental results in terms of influence spread and running time on nine real‐world social networks demonstrate that the proposed OCPSO is competitive and promising comparing to several state‐of‐the‐arts(e.g.CGA,CMA‐IM,CIM,CDH‐SHRINK,CNCG,and CFIN).

Deep Neural Network for Detecting Fake Profiles in Social Networks

This paper proposes a deep neural network(DNN)approach for detecting fake profiles in social networks.The DNN model is trained on a large dataset of real and fake profiles and is designed to learn complex features and patterns that distinguish between the two types of profiles.In addition,the present research aims to determine the minimum set of profile data required for recognizing fake profiles on Facebook and propose the deep convolutional neural network method for fake accounts detection on social networks,which has been developed using 16 features based on content-based and profilebased features.The results demonstrated that the proposed method could detect fake profiles with an accuracy of 99.4%,equivalent to the achieved findings based on bigger data sets and more extensive profile information.The results were obtained with the minimum available profile data.In addition,in comparison with the other methods that use the same amount and kind of data,the proposed deep neural network gives an increase in accuracy of roughly 14%.The proposed model outperforms existing methods,achieving high accuracy and F1 score in identifying fake profiles.The associated findings indicate that the proposed model attained an average accuracy of 99%while considering two distinct scenarios:one with a single theme and another with a miscellaneous one.The results demonstrate the potential of DNNs in addressing the challenging problem of detecting fake profiles,which has significant implications for maintaining the authenticity and trustworthiness of online social networks.

Spotted Hyena Optimizer with Deep Learning Driven Cybersecurity for Social Networks

Recent developments on Internet and social networking have led to the growth of aggressive language and hate speech.Online provocation,abuses,and attacks are widely termed cyberbullying(CB).The massive quantity of user generated content makes it difficult to recognize CB.Current advancements in machine learning(ML),deep learning(DL),and natural language processing(NLP)tools enable to detect and classify CB in social networks.In this view,this study introduces a spotted hyena optimizer with deep learning driven cybersecurity(SHODLCS)model for OSN.The presented SHODLCS model intends to accomplish cybersecurity from the identification of CB in the OSN.For achieving this,the SHODLCS model involves data pre-processing and TF-IDF based feature extraction.In addition,the cascaded recurrent neural network(CRNN)model is applied for the identification and classification of CB.Finally,the SHO algorithm is exploited to optimally tune the hyperparameters involved in the CRNN model and thereby results in enhanced classifier performance.The experimental validation of the SHODLCS model on the benchmark dataset portrayed the better outcomes of the SHODLCS model over the recent approaches.

Malicious Activities Prediction Over Online Social Networking Using Ensemble Model

With the vast advancements in Information Technology,the emergence of Online Social Networking(OSN)has also hit its peak and captured the atten-tion of the young generation people.The clone intends to replicate the users and inject massive malicious activities that pose a crucial security threat to the original user.However,the attackers also target this height of OSN utilization,explicitly creating the clones of the user’s account.Various clone detection mechanisms are designed based on social-network activities.For instance,monitoring the occur-rence of clone edges is done to restrict the generation of clone activities.However,this assumption is unsuitable for a real-time environment and works optimally during the simulation process.This research concentrates on modeling and effi-cient clone prediction and avoidance methods to help the social network activists and the victims enhance the clone prediction accuracy.This model does not rely on assumptions.Here,an ensemble Adaptive Random Subspace is used for clas-sifying the clone victims with k-Nearest Neighbour(k-NN)as a base classifier.The weighted clone nodes are analysed using the weighted graph theory concept based on the classified results.When the weighted node’s threshold value is high-er,the trust establishment is terminated,and the clones are ranked and sorted in the higher place for termination.Thus,the victims are alert to the clone propaga-tion over the online social networking end,and the validation is done using the MATLAB 2020a simulation environment.The model shows a better trade-off than existing approaches like Random Forest(RF),Naïve Bayes(NB),and the standard graph model.Various performance metrics like True Positive Rate(TPR),False Alarm Rate(FAR),Recall,Precision,F-measure,and ROC and run time analysis are evaluated to show the significance of the model.

Effect of Online Social Networking on Emotional Status and Its Interaction with Offline Reality during the Early Stage of the COVID-19 Pandemic in China

Background:During the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in China,social interactions shifted to online spaces due to lockdowns and social distancing measures.As a result,the impact of online social networking on users’emotional status has become stronger than ever.This study examines the association between online social networking and Internet users’emotional status and how offline reality affects this relationship.Methods:The study utilizes cross-sectional online survey data(n=3004)and Baidu Migration big data from the first 3 months of the pandemic.Two dimensions of online networking are measured:social support and information sources.Results:First,individuals’online social support(β=0.16,p<0.05)and information sources(β=0.08,p<0.01)are both positively associated to their emotional status during the epidemic.Second,these positive associations are moderated by social status and provincial pandemic control interventions.With regards to the moderation effect of social status,the constructive impact of information sources on emotional well-being is more pronounced among individuals from vulnerable groups compared to those who are not.With regard to the moderation effect of provincial interventions,online social support has the potential to alleviate the adverse repercussions of high rates of confirmed COVID-19 cases and strict lockdown measures while simultaneously augmenting the favorable effects of recovery.Conclusion:The various dimensions of social networking exert distinct effects on emotional status through diverse mechanisms,all of which must be taken into account when designing and adapting pandemic-control interventions.