We consider the problem of task offloading and resource allocation in mobile edge computing (MEC). To maintain satisfactory quality of experience (QoE) of end-users, mobile devices (MDs) may offload their tasks to edge servers based on the allocated computation (e.g., CPU/GPU cycles and storage) and wireless resources (e.g., bandwidth). However, these resources could not be effectively utilized unless an encouraging resource allocation scheme can be proposed. What’s worse, task offloading incurs additional MEC energy consumption, which inevitably violate the long-term MEC energy budget. Considering these two challenges, we propose an online joint offloading and resource allocation (JORA) framework under the long-term MEC energy constraint, aiming at guaranteeing the end-users’ QoE. To achieve this, we leverage Lyapunov optimization to exploit the optimality of the long-term QoE maximization problem. By constructing an energy deficit queue to guide energy consumption, the problem can be solved in a real-time manner. On this basis, we propose online JORA methods in both centralized and distributed manners. Furthermore, we prove that our proposed methods enable the achievement of the close-to-optimal performance while satisfying the long-term MEC energy constraint. In addition, we conduct extensive simulations and the results show superiority in performance over other methods.

Vehicular edge computing (VEC) provides an effective task offloading paradigm by pushing cloud resources to the vehicular network edges, e.g., road side units (RSUs). However, overloaded RSUs are likely to occur especially in urban aggregation areas, possibly leading to greatly compromised offloading performance. Inspired by this, this article explores this situation by introducing an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to address the VEC overload problem. Specifically, we formulate a novel online UAV-assisted vehicular task offloading problem to minimize vehicular task delay under the long-term UAV energy constraint. To solve the formulated problem, we first decouple the long-term energy constraint based on the Lyapunov optimization technique. In this way, the problem can be solved in a real-time manner without requiring future information. Then, we construct a Markov chain based on Markov approximation optimization to find out the close-to-optimal UAV-assisted offloading strategies. Furthermore, we derive a mathematical analysis to rigorously demonstrate the offloading performance of the proposed algorithm. Additionally, the simulation results show that the proposed method outperforms the baselines by significantly reducing the vehicular task delay constrained by the long-term UAV energy budget under various system parameters, such as the energy budget and computation workloads.

Mobile edge computing (MEC) and device-to-device (D2D) offloading are two promising paradigms in the industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). In this article, we investigate task co-offloading, where computing-intensive industrial tasks can be offloaded to MEC servers via cellular links or nearby IIoT devices via D2D links. This co-offloading delivers small computation delay while avoiding network congestion. However, erratic movements, the selfish nature of devices and incomplete offloading information bring inherent challenges. Motivated by these, we propose a co-offloading framework, integrating migration cost and offloading willingness, in D2D-assisted MEC networks. Then, we investigate a learning-based task co-offloading algorithm, with the goal of minimal system cost (i.e., task delay and migration cost). The proposed algorithm enables IIoT devices to observe and learn the system cost from candidate edge nodes, thereby selecting the optimal edge node without requiring complete offloading information. Furthermore, we conduct simulations to verify the proposed co-offloading algorithm.

Location-based services (LBSs) provide enhanced functionality and convenience of ubiquitous computing, but they open up new vulnerabilities that can be utilized to violate the users’ privacy. The leakage of private location data in the LBS context has drawn significant attention from academics and industry due to its importance, leading to numerous research efforts aiming to confront the related challenges. However, to the best of our knowledge, none of relevant studies have performed a qualitative and quantitative comparison and analysis of the complex topic of designing countermeasures and discussed the viability of their use with different kinds of services and the potential elements that could be deployed to meet new challenges. Accordingly, the purpose of this survey is to examine the privacy-preserving techniques in LBSs. We categorize and provide an inside-out review of the existing techniques. Performing a retrospective analysis of several typical studies in each category, we summarize their basic principles and recent advances. Additionally, we highlight the use of privacy-preserving techniques in LBSs for enabling new research opportunities. Providing an up-to-date and comprehensive overview of existing studies, this survey may further stimulate new research efforts into this promising field.

Autonomous driving has so far received numerous attention from academia and industry. However, the inevitable occlusion is a great menace to safety and reliable driving. Existing works have primarily focused on improving the perception ability of a single autonomous vehicle (AV), but the safety problem brought by occlusions remains unanswered. In this paper, we propose a multi-tier perception task offloading framework with a collaborative computing approach, where an AV is able to achieve a comprehensive perception of the concerned region-of-interest (RoI) by leveraging collaborative computation with nearby AVs and road side units (RSUs). Besides, the collaborative computation provides offloading service for computationally intensive tasks so as to reduce processing delay. Specifically, we formulate a joint problem of perception task assignment, offloading and resource allocation, by fully considering the AV’s mobility, task dependency, and delay requirement. The collaborative offloading is modeled as a mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) problem. We design a two-layer binary intelligent firefly (TL-BIFA) algorithm to solve MINLP, with the goal of minimizing execution delay. The proposed TL-BIFA synthesizes the advantages of heuristic methods and deterministic methods. Through extensive simulations, the proposed collaborative offloading approach and the TL-BIFA show superiority in enhancing the autonomous driving system’s safety, efficiency and resource utilization.

Long-term evolution advanced (LTE-A) heterogeneous networks have been observed to offer reliable and service-differentiated communication, thereby enabling numerous mobile applications such as smart meters, remote sensors, and vehicular applications. This fact envisions the trend of Internet of things (IoT) underlaying heterogeneous small cell networks. On this basis, this paper proposes an energy-efficient framework for such a scenario, where multitier heterogeneous small cell networks provide wireless connection and seamless coverage for mobile users and IoT nodes. In our proposed framework, an elastic cell-zooming algorithm based on the quality of service and traffic loads of end-users is performed by adaptively adjusting the transmission power of small cells in order to reduce energy consumption. In addition, aiming at the high energy efficiency of IoT underlaying small cell networks, a clustering-based IoT structure is used, where a SWIPT-CH selection algorithm is proposed to maximize the average residual energy of IoT nodes and to mitigate resource competition between IoT nodes and mobile users.