Belief-Space Quantum-Inspired Reinforcement Learning for Partially Observable Autonomous Cyber Defense in the Internet of Vehicles

• URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2606.07796v1
• Date: Fri, 05 Jun 2026 19:20:38 GMT
• Title: Belief-Space Quantum-Inspired Reinforcement Learning for Partially Observable Autonomous Cyber Defense in the Internet of Vehicles
• Abstract summary: Internet of Vehicles (IoV) faces a dynamic, adversarial security environment where attackers adapt to defenses.<n>We formulate IoV security as a sequential attacker-defender interaction and model defense as a reinforcement learning problem under partial observability.<n>We propose Quantum Belief-Integrated Reinforcement Defense (Q-BIRD) using quantum-inspired belief representation to encode defender uncertainty about hidden attacker intent.
• Score: 1.1411682827396572
• License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Abstract: The Internet of Vehicles (IoV) faces a dynamic, adversarial security environment where attackers adapt to defenses. Existing intrusion detection systems rely on static classifiers that fail to capture sequential decision-making, attacker adaptation, and uncertainty. We formulate IoV security as a sequential attacker-defender interaction and model defense as a reinforcement learning problem under partial observability. We propose Quantum Belief-Integrated Reinforcement Defense (Q-BIRD), using quantum-inspired belief representation to encode defender uncertainty about hidden attacker intent via amplitude-based states, enabling non-Bayesian belief evolution. Integrated into a Proximal Policy Optimization (PPO) defender, Q-BIRD selects cost-aware mitigation actions. In simulated environments with adaptive, probing attackers, Q-BIRD reduced cumulative mean damage, damage variance, and attack success rate (ASR) by 60.4%, 90.2%, and 50.0%, respectively, while increasing survival probability by 46.4%. Compared to classical Bayesian PPO, damage variance reduction and ASR improved by 10.2 times and 50%. Ablation and explainability analyses confirm that amplitude-based belief is the primary decision signal during strategy transitions when classical belief collapses, providing superior IoV security without additional hardware.

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