{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,7]],"date-time":"2026-08-07T15:14:13Z","timestamp":1786115653441,"version":"build-2736575974"},"reference-count":38,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"15","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,4]],"date-time":"2026-08-04T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1785801600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["62372361"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["62372361"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"award":["62372361"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["62372361"]}],"id":[{"id":"https:\/\/ror.org\/01h0zpd94","id-type":"ROR","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100004731","name":"Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["LY24F020011"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["LY24F020011"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100004731","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"award":["LY24F020011"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["LY24F020011"]}],"id":[{"id":"https:\/\/ror.org\/04aqat463","id-type":"ROR","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Sensors"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Covert communication has emerged as a promising technique for protecting wireless transmissions by concealing the existence of legitimate communication from malicious wardens. However, achieving end-to-end covert communication in space\u2013air\u2013ground integrated networks (SAGINs) is challenging due to the coupled effects of satellite-to-ground relay access, ground multi-hop forwarding, and cooperative jamming. In this paper, we propose an incentive-aware end-to-end covert routing framework for SAGINs, where a low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite delivers information to a ground destination through a selected relay base station and a self-organizing ground route. We first establish a two-stage SAGIN model and characterize the satellite-to-ground covert capacity under satellite sidelobe interference, as well as the ground-route covert performance in the presence of multiple wardens and cooperative jammers. Since jammers are self-interested and incur power costs when generating artificial interference, we design an incentive mechanism to stimulate cooperative jamming for enhancing ground-route covertness. Specifically, the reward allocation and jamming-power response are jointly derived by considering both the route-dependent covertness gain and the power cost of jammers. Based on the resulting route-dependent utility, the ground routing problem is further transformed into a shortest-weighted path-finding problem. To improve the long-term stability of satellite-to-ground relay access, we model the repeated interaction between the LEO satellite transmitter and the satellite warden as a base-station selection process and develop a zero-determinant strategy to stabilize the long-term expected utility relation under different warden monitoring policies. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed framework effectively balances satellite-to-ground covert capacity and ground-route utility, outperforms baseline relay selection schemes, and achieves stable long-term covert routing performance against uncertain warden behaviors.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/s26154924","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,4]],"date-time":"2026-08-04T12:32:43Z","timestamp":1785846763000},"page":"4924","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Incentive-Aware End-to-End Covert Routing for Space\u2013Air\u2013Ground Integrated Networks"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"26","author":[{"given":"Zhao","family":"Deng","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"No. 30 Research Institute of China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, Chengdu 610041, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Mingze","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computer Science and Technology, Xidian University, Xi\u2019an 710071, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Nannan","family":"Sun","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computer Science and Technology, Xidian University, Xi\u2019an 710071, China"},{"name":"China Satellite Network Application Co., Ltd., Beijing 100160, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Shouxin","family":"Cao","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computer Science and Technology, Xidian University, Xi\u2019an 710071, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Yue","family":"Gao","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computer Science and Technology, Xidian University, Xi\u2019an 710071, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2037-6948","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Yang","family":"Xu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computer Science and Technology, Xidian University, Xi\u2019an 710071, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,4]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"3327","DOI":"10.1109\/JSAC.2024.3492720","article-title":"Space-Air-Ground Integrated Wireless Networks for 6G: Basics, Key Technologies and Future Trends","volume":"42","author":"Xiao","year":"2024","journal-title":"IEEE J. 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