A method utilizing vector representation is investigated for determining a faulty elenlent in passive and active networks by simple external measurements. A large system may be considered as an interconnection of a number of subnetlvorks. By utilizing the relationships between the magintudes of a transfer function at various frequencies and the deviations of a circuit element, the fault simulation curves can be drawn. The fault identification regions are defined from the fault simulation curves. A fault identlfication matrix is constructed corresponding the defined fault identification regions. The fault identification matrix, when premultiplied by a vector whose components are measured from a network, yieldg another vector whose components identify a network element which is faulty. A test procedure for the fault identification method is presented and verified by experiments.