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ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing (PODC)

Randomness vs. fault-tolerance

Ran Canetti, Eyal Kushilevitz Z, Rafail Ostrovsky, Adi Rosén

Published Jan 1, 1997• 12 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We investigate the relations between the fault tolemnce (or resilience) and the mndornnea requirements of multiparty protocols.Fault-tolerance is measured in terms of the maximum number of colluding faulty players, t, that a protocol can withstand and still maintain the privacy of the inputs and the correctness of the outputs (of the honeat players).Randomness is measured in terms of the total number of random bits needed by the players in order to execute the protocol.Previously, the upper bound on the amount of randomncm needed for securely computing any non-trivial function ~was polynomial both in n, the total number of parties, and the circuit-size C(f).This was the state of knowledge even for the special case t = 1 (i.e., when there is at most one malicious player).In this paper, we show that for any linear-size circuit, and for any value t < n/2, O(poly(t) .log n) randomness is srtflicient.More generally, we show that for any function j with circuit-size C(~), we need only O (poiy(t) .log n + polg(t) .~) randomness in order to withstrmd any coalition of size at most t.Moreover, in our prot~ CO1 only t + 1 players flip coins and the rest of the players are deterministic.Our results generalize to the case of adaptive adversaries as well.

DOI
10.1145/259380.259416

Related papers

Randomness versus Fault-Tolerance.

Ran Canetti, Eyal Kushilevitz Z, Rafail Ostrovsky +1 more

We investigate the relations between two major properties of multiparty protocols: fault tolerance (or resilience) and randomness. Fault-tolerance is measured in terms of the maximum number of colluding faulty parties, t, that a protocol can withstand and still maintain the privacy of the inputs and the correctness of the outputs (of the honest parties). Randomness is measured in terms of the total number of random bits needed by the parties in order to execute the protocol. Previously, the upper bound on the amount of randomness required by general constructions for securely computing any non-trivial function f was polynomial both in n, the total number of parties, and the circuit-size C(f). This was the state of knowledge even for the special case t = 1 (i.e., when there is at most one faulty party). In this paper, we show that for any linear-size circuit, and for any number t ! n=3 of faulty parties, O(poly(t) \\Delta log n) randomness is sufficient. More generally, we show that for...

•Jan 1, 1998•0 citations

Impossibility of Black-Box Reduction from Non-Adaptively to Adaptively Secure Coin-Flipping

Yevgeniy Dodis

Collective Coin-Flipping is a classical problem where n computationally unbounded processors are trying to generate a random bit in a setting where only a single broadcast channel is available for communication. The protocol is said to be b(n)-resilient if any adversary that can corrupt up to b(n) players, still cannot bias the coin to some desired outcome almost certainly. The problem is extensively studied for the case of non-adaptive adversaries who have to decide which players to corrupt before the protocol starts. In particular, it is well-known that the optimum resilience threshold is n=2 in this case. However, none of these protocols is resilient against an adaptive adversary who can corrupt just a single player in the course of the execution. In fact, Ben-Or and Linial [BL90] conjectured that the adaptive adversary is much more powerful than the non-adaptive adversary. More specically, that the optimal resilience threshold for adaptive adversaries is only O( p n) (which is achieved by a simple "majority " protocol). We give strong evidence towards this conjecture by showing that no black-box transformation from any statically secure coin-flipping protocol can yield an adaptively secure protocol tolerating

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On Randomness Complexity of 1-Private Protocols

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In the field of information-theoretic cryptography, randomness complexity is a key metric for protocols for private computation, that is, the number of random bits needed to realize the protocol. Although some general bounds are known, even for the relatively simple example of 1-private computation of n-party AND, the exact complexity is unknown. We study two settings. First, we consider the model of Goyal, Ishai, and Song (Crypto '22) where helper parties without any inputs are allowed to assist in the computation. In this setting, we show that two random bits always suffice to compute an arbitrary Boolean circuit C 1-privately: a single designated inputless helper flips the two bits and privately distributes the derived one-time bits to the other helper parties and the input parties as they are needed. We give an explicit construction using seven helper parties per AND gate and three helper parties per XOR gate (plus the single global randomness dealer). Moreover, two random bits are necessary already for the AND functionality (by a reduction to the standard no-helper model together with the lower bound of Kushilevitz, Ostrovsky, Prouff, Rosén, Thillard and Vergnaud (TCC '19), and therefore the worst-case helper-party randomness complexity is exactly 2 bits. Second, in the setting without helper parties, we improve the upper bound from Couteau and Rosén (Asiacrypt '22) on the (asymptotic) randomness complexity of n-party AND from 6 to 5 bits. That is, we give a 1-private protocol for computing the AND of n parties' inputs requiring 5 bits of randomness, for all n ≥ 6. Our construction, like that of Couteau and Rosén, uses a single party to flip the 5 bits and distribute the required derived values during the execution. Our approach to both problems is built around a more systematic exploration of techniques for recycling randomness across sub-computations. As part of resolving the second problem, we isolate an exact local-independence combinatorial object called a Sliding-Window Independence Generator, or a SWIG. A (k,m)-SWIG is a linear generator from a k-bit seed to m ≥ k output bits, where every cyclic length-k sliding window chosen from m output bits is perfectly uniform. We give an explicit (k,m)-SWIG for every k ≥ 1 and every m ≥ k and use a (5,n-1)-SWIG in our no-helper AND protocol.

Leibniz international proceedings in informatics•Jan 1, 2026•0 citations

Lower bounds on the amount of randomness in private computation

Anna Gál, Adi Rosén

We consider the amount of randomness necessary in information-theoretic private protocols. We prove that at least Ω(log n) random bits are necessary for the t-private computation of the function xor by n players, for any t ≥ 2. In view of the upper bound of O(t2log(n/t))[19], this bound is tight, up to constant factors, for any fixed t. For a class of protocols obeying certain restrictions, we give stronger lower bounds of Ω(t log (n/t)). We note that all known randomness efficient private protocols designed specifically for xor belong to this class. All our lower bounds hold for the "trusted dealer" model as well, and the Ω(t log (n/t)) lower bound for restricted protocols is tight, up to constant factors, for any t ≥ 2 in this model.In comparison, the previous lower bounds on the amount of randomness required by t-private computation of explicit functions did not grow with n for constant values of t, and our results improve the previous lower bounds for xor for any 2 ≤ t = o(log n). Our results also show that already for t = 2, Ω(log n) random bits are necessary, while it is known that for the case of t = 1 a single random bit is sufficient for privately computing xor for any number of players.Our proofs use novel techniques by which we extract random variables from a t-private protocol, and then use the t-privacy property of the protocol to prove properties of these random variables. These properties in turn imply that the number of random bits used by the players is large.

ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC)•Jun 9, 2003•13 citations

Lower bounds on the amount of randomness in private computation

Anna Gál, Adi Rosén

We consider the amount of randomness necessary in information-theoretic private protocols. We prove that at least Ω(log n) random bits are necessary for the t-private computation of the function xor by n players, for any t ≥ 2. In view of the upper bound of O(t2log(n/t))[19], this bound is tight, up to constant factors, for any fixed t. For a class of protocols obeying certain restrictions, we give stronger lower bounds of Ω(t log (n/t)). We note that all known randomness efficient private protocols designed specifically for xor belong to this class. All our lower bounds hold for the "trusted dealer" model as well, and the Ω(t log (n/t)) lower bound for restricted protocols is tight, up to constant factors, for any t ≥ 2 in this model.In comparison, the previous lower bounds on the amount of randomness required by t-private computation of explicit functions did not grow with n for constant values of t, and our results improve the previous lower bounds for xor for any 2 ≤ t = o(log n). Our results also show that already for t = 2, Ω(log n) random bits are necessary, while it is known that for the case of t = 1 a single random bit is sufficient for privately computing xor for any number of players.Our proofs use novel techniques by which we extract random variables from a t-private protocol, and then use the t-privacy property of the protocol to prove properties of these random variables. These properties in turn imply that the number of random bits used by the players is large.

ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC)•Jan 1, 2003•1 citation

A Tight Lower Bound on Adaptively Secure Full-Information Coin Flip

Iftach Haitner, Yonatan Karidi-Heller

In a distributed coin-flipping protocol, Blum [ACM Transactions on Computer Systems ’83], the parties try to output a common (close to) uniform bit, even when some adversarially chosen parties try to bias the common output. In an adaptively secure full-information coin flip, Ben-Or and Linial [FOCS ’85], the parties communicate over a broadcast channel, and a computationally unbounded adversary can choose which parties to corrupt along the protocol execution. Ben-Or and Linial proved that the n -party majority protocol is resilient to \(O(\sqrt {n})\) corruptions, and conjectured this is a tight upper bound for any n -party protocol (of any round complexity). Their conjecture was proved to be correct, up to polylogarithmic factors, for single-turn (each party sends a single message) single-bit (a message is one bit) protocols Lichtenstein et al. [Combinatorica ’89], symmetric protocols Goldwasser et al. [ICALP ’15], and recently for (arbitrary message length) single-turn protocols Tauman Kalai et al. [DISC ’18]. Yet, the question of many-turn protocols was left entirely open. In this work, we close the above gap, proving that no n -party protocol (of any round complexity) is resilient to \(\Omega (\sqrt {n} \cdot \log ^3 n)\) adaptive corruptions. Namely, majority is the optimal coin-flipping protocol against adaptive adversaries (up to polylogarithmic factors).

arXiv:2005.01565•Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science•Nov 1, 2020•13 citations
We investigate the relations between the fault tolemnce (or resilience) and the mndornnea requirements of multiparty protocols.Fault-tolerance is measured in terms of the maximum number of colluding faulty players, t, that a protocol can withstand and still maintain the privacy of the inputs and the correctness of the outputs (of the honeat players).Randomness is measured in terms of the total number of random bits needed by the players in order to execute the protocol.Previously, the upper bound on the amount of randomncm needed for securely computing any non-trivial function was polynomial both in n, the total number of parties, and the circuit-size C(f).This was the state of knowledge even for the special case t = 1 (i.e., when there is at most one malicious player).In this paper, we show that for any linear-size circuit, and for any value t < n/2, O(poly(t) .log n) randomness is srtflicient.More generally, we show that for any function j with circuit-size C(), we need only O (poiy(t) .log n + polg(t) .) randomness in order to withstrmd any coalition of size at most t.Moreover, in our prot CO1 only t + 1 players flip coins and the rest of the players are deterministic.Our results generalize to the case of adaptive adversaries as well.
We investigate the relations between two major properties of multiparty protocols: fault tolerance (or resilience) and randomness. Fault-tolerance is measured in terms of the maximum number of colluding faulty parties, t, that a protocol can withstand and still maintain the privacy of the inputs and the correctness of the outputs (of the honest parties). Randomness is measured in terms of the total number of random bits needed by the parties in order to execute the protocol. Previously, the upper bound on the amount of randomness required by general constructions for securely computing any non-trivial function f was polynomial both in n, the total number of parties, and the circuit-size C(f). This was the state of knowledge even for the special case t = 1 (i.e., when there is at most one faulty party). In this paper, we show that for any linear-size circuit, and for any number t ! n=3 of faulty parties, O(poly(t) \\Delta log n) randomness is sufficient. More generally, we show that for...
Collective Coin-Flipping is a classical problem where n computationally unbounded processors are trying to generate a random bit in a setting where only a single broadcast channel is available for communication. The protocol is said to be b(n)-resilient if any adversary that can corrupt up to b(n) players, still cannot bias the coin to some desired outcome almost certainly. The problem is extensively studied for the case of non-adaptive adversaries who have to decide which players to corrupt before the protocol starts. In particular, it is well-known that the optimum resilience threshold is n=2 in this case. However, none of these protocols is resilient against an adaptive adversary who can corrupt just a single player in the course of the execution. In fact, Ben-Or and Linial [BL90] conjectured that the adaptive adversary is much more powerful than the non-adaptive adversary. More specically, that the optimal resilience threshold for adaptive adversaries is only O( p n) (which is achieved by a simple "majority " protocol). We give strong evidence towards this conjecture by showing that no black-box transformation from any statically secure coin-flipping protocol can yield an adaptively secure protocol tolerating
In the field of information-theoretic cryptography, randomness complexity is a key metric for protocols for private computation, that is, the number of random bits needed to realize the protocol. Although some general bounds are known, even for the relatively simple example of 1-private computation of n-party AND, the exact complexity is unknown. We study two settings. First, we consider the model of Goyal, Ishai, and Song (Crypto '22) where helper parties without any inputs are allowed to assist in the computation. In this setting, we show that two random bits always suffice to compute an arbitrary Boolean circuit C 1-privately: a single designated inputless helper flips the two bits and privately distributes the derived one-time bits to the other helper parties and the input parties as they are needed. We give an explicit construction using seven helper parties per AND gate and three helper parties per XOR gate (plus the single global randomness dealer). Moreover, two random bits are necessary already for the AND functionality (by a reduction to the standard no-helper model together with the lower bound of Kushilevitz, Ostrovsky, Prouff, Rosén, Thillard and Vergnaud (TCC '19), and therefore the worst-case helper-party randomness complexity is exactly 2 bits. Second, in the setting without helper parties, we improve the upper bound from Couteau and Rosén (Asiacrypt '22) on the (asymptotic) randomness complexity of n-party AND from 6 to 5 bits. That is, we give a 1-private protocol for computing the AND of n parties' inputs requiring 5 bits of randomness, for all n ≥ 6. Our construction, like that of Couteau and Rosén, uses a single party to flip the 5 bits and distribute the required derived values during the execution. Our approach to both problems is built around a more systematic exploration of techniques for recycling randomness across sub-computations. As part of resolving the second problem, we isolate an exact local-independence combinatorial object called a Sliding-Window Independence Generator, or a SWIG. A (k,m)-SWIG is a linear generator from a k-bit seed to m ≥ k output bits, where every cyclic length-k sliding window chosen from m output bits is perfectly uniform. We give an explicit (k,m)-SWIG for every k ≥ 1 and every m ≥ k and use a (5,n-1)-SWIG in our no-helper AND protocol.
We consider the amount of randomness necessary in information-theoretic private protocols. We prove that at least Ω(log n) random bits are necessary for the t-private computation of the function xor by n players, for any t ≥ 2. In view of the upper bound of O(t2log(n/t))[19], this bound is tight, up to constant factors, for any fixed t. For a class of protocols obeying certain restrictions, we give stronger lower bounds of Ω(t log (n/t)). We note that all known randomness efficient private protocols designed specifically for xor belong to this class. All our lower bounds hold for the "trusted dealer" model as well, and the Ω(t log (n/t)) lower bound for restricted protocols is tight, up to constant factors, for any t ≥ 2 in this model.In comparison, the previous lower bounds on the amount of randomness required by t-private computation of explicit functions did not grow with n for constant values of t, and our results improve the previous lower bounds for xor for any 2 ≤ t = o(log n). Our results also show that already for t = 2, Ω(log n) random bits are necessary, while it is known that for the case of t = 1 a single random bit is sufficient for privately computing xor for any number of players.Our proofs use novel techniques by which we extract random variables from a t-private protocol, and then use the t-privacy property of the protocol to prove properties of these random variables. These properties in turn imply that the number of random bits used by the players is large.
We consider the amount of randomness necessary in information-theoretic private protocols. We prove that at least Ω(log n) random bits are necessary for the t-private computation of the function xor by n players, for any t ≥ 2. In view of the upper bound of O(t2log(n/t))[19], this bound is tight, up to constant factors, for any fixed t. For a class of protocols obeying certain restrictions, we give stronger lower bounds of Ω(t log (n/t)). We note that all known randomness efficient private protocols designed specifically for xor belong to this class. All our lower bounds hold for the "trusted dealer" model as well, and the Ω(t log (n/t)) lower bound for restricted protocols is tight, up to constant factors, for any t ≥ 2 in this model.In comparison, the previous lower bounds on the amount of randomness required by t-private computation of explicit functions did not grow with n for constant values of t, and our results improve the previous lower bounds for xor for any 2 ≤ t = o(log n). Our results also show that already for t = 2, Ω(log n) random bits are necessary, while it is known that for the case of t = 1 a single random bit is sufficient for privately computing xor for any number of players.Our proofs use novel techniques by which we extract random variables from a t-private protocol, and then use the t-privacy property of the protocol to prove properties of these random variables. These properties in turn imply that the number of random bits used by the players is large.
In a distributed coin-flipping protocol, Blum [ACM Transactions on Computer Systems ’83], the parties try to output a common (close to) uniform bit, even when some adversarially chosen parties try to bias the common output. In an adaptively secure full-information coin flip, Ben-Or and Linial [FOCS ’85], the parties communicate over a broadcast channel, and a computationally unbounded adversary can choose which parties to corrupt along the protocol execution. Ben-Or and Linial proved that the n -party majority protocol is resilient to O(n)O(\sqrt {n})O(n​) corruptions, and conjectured this is a tight upper bound for any n -party protocol (of any round complexity). Their conjecture was proved to be correct, up to polylogarithmic factors, for single-turn (each party sends a single message) single-bit (a message is one bit) protocols Lichtenstein et al. [Combinatorica ’89], symmetric protocols Goldwasser et al. [ICALP ’15], and recently for (arbitrary message length) single-turn protocols Tauman Kalai et al. [DISC ’18]. Yet, the question of many-turn protocols was left entirely open. In this work, we close the above gap, proving that no n -party protocol (of any round complexity) is resilient to Ω(n⋅log⁡3n)\Omega (\sqrt {n} \cdot \log ^3 n)Ω(n​⋅log3n) adaptive corruptions. Namely, majority is the optimal coin-flipping protocol against adaptive adversaries (up to polylogarithmic factors).