{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T21:17:04Z","timestamp":1760217424077,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":24,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"2","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2015,2,11]],"date-time":"2015-02-11T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1423612800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Sensors"],"abstract":"<jats:p>In network communications, mixes provide protection against observers hiding the appearance of messages, patterns, length and links between senders and receivers. Statistical disclosure attacks aim to reveal the identity of senders and receivers in a communication network setting when it is protected by standard techniques based on mixes. This work aims to develop a global statistical disclosure attack to detect relationships between users. The only information used by the attacker is the number of messages sent and received by each user for each round, the batch of messages grouped by the anonymity system. A new modeling framework based on contingency tables is used. The assumptions are more flexible than those used in the literature, allowing to apply the method to multiple situations automatically, such as email data or social networks data. A classification scheme based on combinatoric solutions of the space of rounds retrieved is developed. Solutions about relationships between users are provided for all pairs of users simultaneously, since the dependence of the data retrieved needs to be addressed in a global sense.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/s150204052","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2015,2,11]],"date-time":"2015-02-11T09:52:16Z","timestamp":1423648336000},"page":"4052-4071","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":3,"title":["Extracting Association Patterns in Network Communications"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"15","author":[{"given":"Javier","family":"Portela","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Group of Analysis, Security and Systems (GASS), Department of Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence (DISIA), Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Science, Office 431, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Calle Profesor Jos\u00e9 Garc\u00eda Santesmases, 9, Ciudad Universitaria, Madrid 28040, Spain"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7573-6272","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Luis","family":"Villalba","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Group of Analysis, Security and Systems (GASS), Department of Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence (DISIA), Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Science, Office 431, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Calle Profesor Jos\u00e9 Garc\u00eda Santesmases, 9, Ciudad Universitaria, Madrid 28040, Spain"}]},{"given":"Alejandra","family":"Trujillo","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Group of Analysis, Security and Systems (GASS), Department of Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence (DISIA), Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Science, Office 431, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Calle Profesor Jos\u00e9 Garc\u00eda Santesmases, 9, Ciudad Universitaria, Madrid 28040, Spain"},{"name":"Facultad de Ingenier\u00eda, Universidad Aut\u00f3noma de San Luis Potos\u00ed (UASLP), Zona Universitaria Poniente, San Luis Potos\u00ed 78290, Mexico"}]},{"given":"Ana","family":"Orozco","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Group of Analysis, Security and Systems (GASS), Department of Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence (DISIA), Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Science, Office 431, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Calle Profesor Jos\u00e9 Garc\u00eda Santesmases, 9, Ciudad Universitaria, Madrid 28040, Spain"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-0117-8102","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Tai-hoon","family":"Kim","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Convergence Security, Sungshin Women's University, 249-1 Dongseon-dong 3-ga, Seoul 136-742, Korea"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2015,2,11]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"84","DOI":"10.1145\/358549.358563","article-title":"Untraceable electronic mail, return addresses, and digital pseudonyms","volume":"24","author":"Chaum","year":"1981","journal-title":"Commun. 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