Secure Evaluation of Quantized Neural Networks

Abstract: We investigate two questions in this paper: First, we ask to what extent "MPC friendly" models are already supported by major Machine Learning frameworks such as TensorFlow or PyTorch. Prior works provide protocols that only work on fixed-point integers and specialized activation functions, two aspects that are not supported by popular Machine Learning frameworks, and the need for these specialized model representations means that it is hard, and often impossible, to use e.g., TensorFlow to design, train and test models that later have to be evaluated securely. Second, we ask to what extent the functionality for evaluating Neural Networks already exists in general-purpose MPC frameworks. These frameworks have received more scrutiny, are better documented and supported on more platforms. Furthermore, they are typically flexible in terms of the threat model they support. In contrast, most secure evaluation protocols in the literature are targeted to a specific threat model and their implementations are only a "proof-of-concept", making it very hard for their adoption in practice. We answer both of the above questions in a positive way: We observe that the quantization techniques supported by both TensorFlow, PyTorch and MXNet can provide models in a representation that can be evaluated securely; and moreover, that this evaluation can be performed by a general purpose MPC framework. We perform extensive benchmarks to understand the exact trade-offs between different corruption models, network sizes and efficiency. These experiments provide an interesting insight into cost between active and passive security, as well as honest and dishonest majority. Our work shows then that the separating line between existing ML frameworks and existing MPC protocols may be narrower than implicitly suggested by previous works.