Complex networks are known to be vulnerable to the failure of components in terms of structural robustness. An as yet less researched topic is dynamical robustness, which refers to the ability of a network to maintain its dynamical activity against local disturbances. This paper introduces a new type of attack—the overload attack—to disturb the network’s dynamical activity. The attack is based on the load redistribution model for sequential attacks. The main contribution are heuristics to assess the vulnerability of complex networks with respect to this type of attack. The effectiveness of the heuristics is demonstrated with an application for real power networks.

中文翻译：

---

过载攻击导致复杂网络的级联故障

就结构稳健性而言，已知复杂网络易受组件故障的影响。尚待研究的主题是动态鲁棒性，它是指网络保持其动态活动以抵抗局部干扰的能力。本文介绍了一种新型的攻击-过载攻击-干扰网络的动态活动。该攻击基于顺序攻击的负载重新分配模型。主要的贡献是启发式方法，可以评估复杂网络针对此类攻击的脆弱性。启发式方法的有效性通过实际电力网络的应用得到了证明。