Trustworthy agents for B2B operations under Normative environment

Abstract

Agents intending to be involved in joint B2B operations need to rely on trust measures pointing to possible future solid and secure partnerships. Using Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) as a paradigm for an electronic institution framework enables both to simulate and facilitate the process of autonomous agents, as either enterprises or individual representatives, reaching joint agreements through automatic negotiation. In the heart of the MAS-based electronic institution framework, a Normative Environment provides monitoring capabilities and enforcement mechanisms influencing agents' behavior during joint activities. Moreover, it makes available relevant data that can be important for building up contextual-dependent agent's trust models which, consequently, also influence future possible negotiations leading to new and safer agreements. To support agents information generation, monitoring and fusion, we here present ANTE platform, a software MAS integrating Trust models with negotiation facilities and Normative environments, for the creation and monitoring of agent-based networks.