A Geometric Approach for Real-time Monitoring of Dynamic Large Scale Graphs: AS-level graphs illustrated

Abstract

The monitoring of large dynamic networks is a major chal- lenge for a wide range of application. The complexity stems from properties of the underlying graphs, in which slight local changes can lead to sizable variations of global prop- erties, e.g., under certain conditions, a single link cut that may be overlooked during monitoring can result in splitting the graph into two disconnected components. Moreover, it is often difficult to determine whether a change will propagate globally or remain local. Traditional graph theory measure such as the centrality or the assortativity of the graph are not satisfying to characterize global properties of the graph. In this paper, we tackle the problem of real-time monitoring of dynamic large scale graphs by developing a geometric approach that leverages notions of geometric curvature and recent development in graph embeddings using Ollivier-Ricci curvature [47]. We illustrate the use of our method by consid- ering the practical case of monitoring dynamic variations of global Internet using topology changes information provided by combining several BGP feeds. In particular, we use our method to detect major events and changes via the geometry of the embedding of the graph.