DROPS

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.42

Time and Space Efficient Deterministic List Decoding

Authors: Joshua Cook and Dana Moshkovitz

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 362, 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)

Abstract

Error correcting codes encode messages by codewords in such a way that even if some of the codeword is corrupted, the message can be decoded. Typical decoding algorithms for error correcting codes either use linear space or quadratic time. A natural question is whether codes can be decoded in near-linear time and sub-linear space simultaneously. A recent result by Cook and Moshkovitz gave efficient decoders that can uniquely decode Reed-Muller and other codes from a constant fraction (less than half) of corruption. In this work, we address the problem of list decoding in near-linear time and sub-linear space. In the list decoding setting, most of the codeword is corrupted, and one wants to output a short list of potential messages that contains the true message. For any constants γ, τ > 0, we give decoders for Reed-Muller codes that can decode from 1-γ fraction of corruptions in time n^{1+τ} and space n^{τ}. Our decoders work by extending the iterative correction technique of Cook and Moshkovitz. However, that technique, which gradually decreases the number of corruptions in the message, was tailored to the unique decoding setting. We first identify an intermediate problem, codewords list recovery, for which we can make iterative correction work. We then show how to reduce general list decoding to the codewords list recovery problem in efficient time and space. The reduction relies on local correction and testing. In the codewords list recovery problem, the input consists of n unordered lists containing exactly the symbols from L codewords, where a small fraction of the lists is corrupted. The goal is to find the L codewords. In addition, we prove that any linear code with time-space efficient encoding or decoding must be local, in the sense that the codewords satisfy a local linear constraint. This rules out codes like Reed-Solomon from having time-space efficient encoding or decoding.

Cite as

Joshua Cook and Dana Moshkovitz. Time and Space Efficient Deterministic List Decoding. In 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 362, pp. 42:1-42:24, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2026)

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@InProceedings{cook_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.42,
  author =	{Cook, Joshua and Moshkovitz, Dana},
  title =	{{Time and Space Efficient Deterministic List Decoding}},
  booktitle =	{17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)},
  pages =	{42:1--42:24},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-410-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2026},
  volume =	{362},
  editor =	{Saraf, Shubhangi},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.42},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-253292},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.42},
  annote =	{Keywords: Reed-Muller code, local correction, local testing}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.21

Differential Privacy from Axioms

Authors: Guy Blanc, William Pires, and Toniann Pitassi

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 362, 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)

Abstract

Differential privacy (DP) is the de facto notion of privacy both in theory and in practice. However, despite its popularity, DP imposes strict requirements which guard against strong worst-case scenarios. For example, it guards against seemingly unrealistic scenarios where an attacker has full information about all but one point in the data set, and still nothing can be learned about the remaining point. While preventing such a strong attack is desirable, many works have explored whether average-case relaxations of DP are easier to satisfy [Hall et al., 2013; Wang et al., 2016; Bassily and Freund, 2016; Liu et al., 2023]. In this work, we are motivated by the question of whether alternate, weaker notions of privacy are possible: can a weakened privacy notion still guarantee some basic level of privacy, and on the other hand, achieve privacy more efficiently and/or for a substantially broader set of tasks? Our main result shows the answer is no: even in the statistical setting, any reasonable measure of privacy satisfying nontrivial composition is equivalent to DP. To prove this, we identify a core set of four axioms or desiderata: pre-processing invariance, prohibition of blatant non-privacy, strong composition, and linear scalability. Our main theorem shows that any privacy measure satisfying our axioms is equivalent to DP, up to polynomial factors in sample complexity. We complement this result by showing our axioms are minimal: removing any one of our axioms enables ill-behaved measures of privacy.

Cite as

Guy Blanc, William Pires, and Toniann Pitassi. Differential Privacy from Axioms. In 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 362, pp. 21:1-21:13, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2026)

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@InProceedings{blanc_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.21,
  author =	{Blanc, Guy and Pires, William and Pitassi, Toniann},
  title =	{{Differential Privacy from Axioms}},
  booktitle =	{17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)},
  pages =	{21:1--21:13},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-410-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2026},
  volume =	{362},
  editor =	{Saraf, Shubhangi},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.21},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-253081},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.21},
  annote =	{Keywords: Differential Privacy, Privacy Amplification, Composition}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.23

Decoding Balanced Linear Codes with Preprocessing

Authors: Andrej Bogdanov, Rohit Chatterjee, Yunqi Li, and Prashant Nalini Vasudevan

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 362, 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)

Abstract

Prange’s information set algorithm is a well-known decoding algorithm for linear codes. It decodes corrupted codewords of most 𝔽₂-linear codes C of message length n up to relative error rate O(log n / n) in poly(n) time. We show that the error rate can be improved to O((log n)² / n), provided: (1) the decoder has access to a polynomial-length advice string that depends on C only, and (2) C is n^{-Ω(1)}-balanced. As a consequence we improve the error tolerance in decoding random linear codes if inefficient preprocessing of the code is allowed. This reveals potential vulnerabilities in cryptographic applications of Learning Noisy Parities with low noise rate. Our main technical result is that the Hamming weight of Hw, where the rows of H are a random sample of short dual codewords, measures the proximity of a received word w to the code in the regime of interest. Given such H as advice, our algorithm corrects errors by locally minimizing this measure. We show that for most codes, the error rate tolerated by our decoder is asymptotically optimal among all algorithms whose decision is based on thresholding Hw for an arbitrary polynomial-size advice matrix H.

Cite as

Andrej Bogdanov, Rohit Chatterjee, Yunqi Li, and Prashant Nalini Vasudevan. Decoding Balanced Linear Codes with Preprocessing. In 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 362, pp. 23:1-23:23, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2026)

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@InProceedings{bogdanov_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.23,
  author =	{Bogdanov, Andrej and Chatterjee, Rohit and Li, Yunqi and Vasudevan, Prashant Nalini},
  title =	{{Decoding Balanced Linear Codes with Preprocessing}},
  booktitle =	{17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)},
  pages =	{23:1--23:23},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-410-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2026},
  volume =	{362},
  editor =	{Saraf, Shubhangi},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.23},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-253107},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.23},
  annote =	{Keywords: Linear codes, nearest codeword problem, learning parity with noise}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.68

Fourier Sparsity of Delta Functions and Matching Vector PIRs

Authors: Fatemeh Ghasemi and Swastik Kopparty

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 362, 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)

Abstract

In this paper we study a basic and natural question about Fourier analysis of Boolean functions, which has applications to the study of Matching Vector based Private Information Retrieval (PIR) schemes. For integers m,r, define a delta function on {0,1}^r ⊆ ℤ_m^r to be a function f: ℤ_m^r → C if f(0) = 1 and f(x) = 0 for all nonzero Boolean x. The basic question that we study is how small can the Fourier sparsity of a delta function be; namely, how sparse can such an f be in the Fourier basis? In addition to being intrinsically interesting and natural, such questions arise naturally while studying "S-decoding polynomials" for the known matching vector families. Finding S-decoding polynomials of reduced sparsity - which corresponds to finding delta functions with low Fourier sparsity - would improve the current best PIR schemes. We show nontrivial upper and lower bounds on the Fourier sparsity of delta functions. Our proofs are elementary and clean. These results imply limitations on improvements to the Matching Vector PIR schemes simply by finding better S-decoding polynomials. In particular, there are no S-decoding polynomials which can make Matching Vector PIRs based on the known matching vector families achieve polylogarithmic communication for constantly many servers. Many interesting questions remain open.

Cite as

Fatemeh Ghasemi and Swastik Kopparty. Fourier Sparsity of Delta Functions and Matching Vector PIRs. In 17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 362, pp. 68:1-68:22, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2026)

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@InProceedings{ghasemi_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.68,
  author =	{Ghasemi, Fatemeh and Kopparty, Swastik},
  title =	{{Fourier Sparsity of Delta Functions and Matching Vector PIRs}},
  booktitle =	{17th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2026)},
  pages =	{68:1--68:22},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-410-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2026},
  volume =	{362},
  editor =	{Saraf, Shubhangi},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.68},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-253556},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2026.68},
  annote =	{Keywords: Fourier Sparsity, Matching Vectors, Private Information Retrieval}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.20

Two for One, One for All: Deterministic LDC-Based Robust Computation in Congested Clique

Authors: Keren Censor-Hillel, Orr Fischer, Ran Gelles, and Pedro Soto

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 356, 39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025)

Abstract

We design a deterministic compiler that makes any computation in the Congested Clique model robust to a constant fraction α < 1 of adversarial crash faults. In particular, we show how a network of n nodes can compute any circuit of depth d, width ω, and gate total fan Δ, in d ⋅ ⌈ω/n² + Δ/n⌉ ⋅ 2^{O(√{log{n}}log log{n})} rounds in such a faulty model. As a corollary, any T-round Congested Clique algorithm can be compiled into an algorithm that completes in T² n^{o(1)} rounds in this model. Our compiler obtains resilience to node crashes by coding information across the network, and its main underlying observation is that we can leverage locally-decodable codes (LDCs) to maintain a low complexity overhead, as these allow recovering the information needed at each computational step by querying only small parts of the codeword, instead of retrieving the entire coded message, which is inherent when using block codes. The main technical contribution is that because erasures occur in known locations, which correspond to crashed nodes, we can derandomize classical LDC constructions by deterministically selecting query sets that avoid sufficiently many erasures. Moreover, when decoding multiple codewords in parallel, our derandomization load-balances the queries per-node, thereby preventing congestion and maintaining a low round complexity. Deterministic decoding of LDCs presents a new challenge: the adversary can target precisely the (few) nodes that are queried for decoding a certain codeword. We overcome this issue via an adaptive doubling strategy: if a decoding attempt for a codeword fails, the node doubles the number of its decoding attempts. We employ a similar doubling technique when the adversary crashes the decoding node itself, replacing it dynamically with two other non-crashed nodes. By carefully combining these two doubling processes, we overcome the challenges posed by the combination of a deterministic LDC with a worst case pattern of crashes.

Cite as

Keren Censor-Hillel, Orr Fischer, Ran Gelles, and Pedro Soto. Two for One, One for All: Deterministic LDC-Based Robust Computation in Congested Clique. In 39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 356, pp. 20:1-20:19, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{censorhillel_et_al:LIPIcs.DISC.2025.20,
  author =	{Censor-Hillel, Keren and Fischer, Orr and Gelles, Ran and Soto, Pedro},
  title =	{{Two for One, One for All: Deterministic LDC-Based Robust Computation in Congested Clique}},
  booktitle =	{39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025)},
  pages =	{20:1--20:19},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-402-4},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{356},
  editor =	{Kowalski, Dariusz R.},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.20},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-248379},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.20},
  annote =	{Keywords: Congested Clique, Fault Tolerance, Error Correction Codes}
}

Document

Invited Talk

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.2

Securing Dynamic Data: A Primer on Differentially Private Data Structures (Invited Talk)

Authors: Monika Henzinger and Roodabeh Safavi

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 351, 33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025)

Abstract

We give an introduction into differential privacy in the dynamic setting, called the continual observation setting.

Cite as

Monika Henzinger and Roodabeh Safavi. Securing Dynamic Data: A Primer on Differentially Private Data Structures (Invited Talk). In 33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 351, pp. 2:1-2:14, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{henzinger_et_al:LIPIcs.ESA.2025.2,
  author =	{Henzinger, Monika and Safavi, Roodabeh},
  title =	{{Securing Dynamic Data: A Primer on Differentially Private Data Structures}},
  booktitle =	{33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025)},
  pages =	{2:1--2:14},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-395-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{351},
  editor =	{Benoit, Anne and Kaplan, Haim and Wild, Sebastian and Herman, Grzegorz},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.2},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-244702},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.2},
  annote =	{Keywords: Differential privacy, continual observation}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.111

Hardness of Median and Center in the Ulam Metric

Authors: Nick Fischer, Elazar Goldenberg, Mursalin Habib, and Karthik C. S.

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 351, 33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025)

Abstract

The classical rank aggregation problem seeks to combine a set X of n permutations into a single representative "consensus" permutation. In this paper, we investigate two fundamental rank aggregation tasks under the well-studied Ulam metric: computing a median permutation (which minimizes the sum of Ulam distances to X) and computing a center permutation (which minimizes the maximum Ulam distance to X) in two settings. - Continuous Setting: In the continuous setting, the median/center is allowed to be any permutation. It is known that computing a center in the Ulam metric is NP-hard and we add to this by showing that computing a median is NP-hard as well via a simple reduction from the Max-Cut problem. While this result may not be unexpected, it had remained elusive until now and confirms a speculation by Chakraborty, Das, and Krauthgamer [SODA '21]. - Discrete Setting: In the discrete setting, the median/center must be a permutation from the input set. We fully resolve the fine-grained complexity of the discrete median and discrete center problems under the Ulam metric, proving that the naive Õ(n² L)-time algorithm (where L is the length of the permutation) is conditionally optimal. This resolves an open problem raised by Abboud, Bateni, Cohen-Addad, Karthik C. S., and Seddighin [APPROX '23]. Our reductions are inspired by the known fine-grained lower bounds for similarity measures, but we face and overcome several new highly technical challenges.

Cite as

Nick Fischer, Elazar Goldenberg, Mursalin Habib, and Karthik C. S.. Hardness of Median and Center in the Ulam Metric. In 33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 351, pp. 111:1-111:17, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{fischer_et_al:LIPIcs.ESA.2025.111,
  author =	{Fischer, Nick and Goldenberg, Elazar and Habib, Mursalin and Karthik C. S.},
  title =	{{Hardness of Median and Center in the Ulam Metric}},
  booktitle =	{33rd Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2025)},
  pages =	{111:1--111:17},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-395-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{351},
  editor =	{Benoit, Anne and Kaplan, Haim and Wild, Sebastian and Herman, Grzegorz},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.111},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-245809},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2025.111},
  annote =	{Keywords: Ulam distance, median, center, rank aggregation, fine-grained complexity}
}

Document

RANDOM

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.APPROX/RANDOM.2025.37

Permanental Rank vs Determinantal Rank of Random Matrices over Finite Fields

Authors: Fatemeh Ghasemi, Gal Gross, and Swastik Kopparty

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 353, Approximation, Randomization, and Combinatorial Optimization. Algorithms and Techniques (APPROX/RANDOM 2025)

Abstract

This paper is motivated by basic complexity and probability questions about permanents of random matrices over small finite fields, and in particular, about properties separating the permanent and the determinant. Let q be a fixed odd prime, and let k ≤ n both be growing. For a uniformly random n × k matrix A over 𝔽_q, we study the probability that all k × k submatrices of A have zero permanent; namely that A does not have full permanental rank. When k = n, this is simply the probability that a random square matrix over 𝔽_q has zero permanent, which we do not understand. We believe that the probability in this case is 1/q + o(1), which would be in contrast to the case of the determinant, where the answer is 1/q + Ω_q(1). Our main result is that when k is O(√n), the probability that a random n × k matrix does not have full permanental rank is essentially the same as the probability that the matrix has a 0 column, namely (1 +o(1)) k/qⁿ. In contrast, for determinantal (standard) rank the analogous probability is Θ(q^k/q^n). At the core of our result are some basic linear algebraic properties of the permanent that distinguish it from the determinant.

Cite as

Fatemeh Ghasemi, Gal Gross, and Swastik Kopparty. Permanental Rank vs Determinantal Rank of Random Matrices over Finite Fields. In Approximation, Randomization, and Combinatorial Optimization. Algorithms and Techniques (APPROX/RANDOM 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 353, pp. 37:1-37:15, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{ghasemi_et_al:LIPIcs.APPROX/RANDOM.2025.37,
  author =	{Ghasemi, Fatemeh and Gross, Gal and Kopparty, Swastik},
  title =	{{Permanental Rank vs Determinantal Rank of Random Matrices over Finite Fields}},
  booktitle =	{Approximation, Randomization, and Combinatorial Optimization. Algorithms and Techniques (APPROX/RANDOM 2025)},
  pages =	{37:1--37:15},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-397-3},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{353},
  editor =	{Ene, Alina and Chattopadhyay, Eshan},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.APPROX/RANDOM.2025.37},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-244037},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.APPROX/RANDOM.2025.37},
  annote =	{Keywords: Permanent, random matrices over a finite field}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.8

On the Definition of Malicious Private Information Retrieval

Authors: Bar Alon and Amos Beimel

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 343, 6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025)

Abstract

A multi-server private information retrieval (PIR) protocol allows a client to obtain an entry of its choice from a database, held by one or more servers, while hiding the identity of the entry from small enough coalitions of servers. In this paper, we study PIR protocols in which some of the servers are malicious and may not send messages according to the pre-described protocol. In previous papers, such protocols were defined by requiring that they are correct, private, and robust to malicious servers, i.e., by listing 3 properties that they should satisfy. However, 40 years of experience in studying secure multiparty protocols taught us that defining the security of protocols by a list of required properties is problematic. In this paper, we rectify this situation and define the security of PIR protocols with malicious servers using the real vs. ideal paradigm. We study the relationship between the property-based definition of PIR protocols and the real vs. ideal definition, showing the following results: - We prove that if we require full security from PIR protocols, e.g., the client outputs the correct value of the database entry with high probability even if a minority of the servers are malicious, then the two definitions are equivalent. This implies that constructions of such protocols that were proven secure using the property-based definition are actually secure under the "correct" definition of security. - We show that if we require security-with-abort from PIR protocols (called PIR protocols with error-detection in previous papers), i.e., protocols in which the user either outputs the correct value or an abort symbol, then there are protocols that are secure under the property-based definition; however, they do not satisfy the real vs. ideal definition, that is, they can be attacked allowing selective abort. This shows that the property-based definition of PIR protocols with security-with-abort is problematic. - We consider the compiler of Eriguchi et al. (TCC 22) that starts with a PIR protocol that is secure against semi-honest servers and constructs a PIR protocol with security-with-abort; this compiler implies the best-known PIR protocols with security-with-abort. We show that applying this compiler does not result in PIR protocols that are secure according to the real vs. ideal definition. However, we prove that a simple modification of this compiler results in PIR protocols that are secure according to the real vs. ideal definition.

Cite as

Bar Alon and Amos Beimel. On the Definition of Malicious Private Information Retrieval. In 6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 343, pp. 8:1-8:23, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{alon_et_al:LIPIcs.ITC.2025.8,
  author =	{Alon, Bar and Beimel, Amos},
  title =	{{On the Definition of Malicious Private Information Retrieval}},
  booktitle =	{6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025)},
  pages =	{8:1--8:23},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-385-0},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{343},
  editor =	{Gilboa, Niv},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.8},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-243581},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.8},
  annote =	{Keywords: Private information retrieval, secure multiparty computation}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.1

Amortized Locally Decodable Codes for Insertions and Deletions

Authors: Jeremiah Blocki and Justin Zhang

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 343, 6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025)

Abstract

Locally Decodable Codes (LDCs) are error correcting codes which permit the recovery of any single message symbol with a low number of queries to the codeword (the locality). Traditional LDC tradeoffs between the rate, locality, and error tolerance are undesirable even in relaxed settings where the encoder/decoder share randomness or where the channel is resource-bounded. Recent work by Blocki and Zhang initiated the study of Hamming amortized Locally Decodable Codes (aLDCs), which allow the local decoder to amortize their number of queries over the recovery of a small subset of message symbols. Surprisingly, Blocki and Zhang construct asymptotically ideal (constant rate, constant amortized locality, and constant error tolerance) Hamming aLDCs in private-key and resource-bounded settings. While this result overcame previous barriers and impossibility results for Hamming LDCs, it is not clear whether the techniques extend to Insdel LDCs. Constructing Insdel LDCs which are resilient to insertion and/or deletion errors is known to be even more challenging. For example, Gupta (STOC'24) proved that no Insdel LDC with constant rate and error tolerance exists even in relaxed settings. Our first contribution is to provide a Hamming-to-Insdel compiler which transforms any amortized Hamming LDC that satisfies a particular property (consecutive interval querying) to amortized Insdel LDC while asymptotically preserving the rate, error tolerance and amortized locality. Prior Hamming-to-Insdel compilers of Ostrovsky and Paskin-Cherniavsky (ICITS'15) and Block et al. (FSTTCS'20) worked for arbitrary Hamming LDCs, but incurred an undesirable polylogarithmic blow-up in the locality. Our second contribution is a construction of an ideal amortized Hamming LDC which satisfies our special property (consecutive interval querying) in the relaxed settings where the sender/receiver share randomness or where the channel is resource bounded. Taken together, we obtain ideal Insdel aLDCs in private-key and resource-bounded settings with constant amortized locality, constant rate and constant error tolerance. This result is surprising in light of Gupta’s (STOC'24) impossibility result which demonstrates a strong separation between locality and amortized locality for Insdel LDCs.

Cite as

Jeremiah Blocki and Justin Zhang. Amortized Locally Decodable Codes for Insertions and Deletions. In 6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 343, pp. 1:1-1:23, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{blocki_et_al:LIPIcs.ITC.2025.1,
  author =	{Blocki, Jeremiah and Zhang, Justin},
  title =	{{Amortized Locally Decodable Codes for Insertions and Deletions}},
  booktitle =	{6th Conference on Information-Theoretic Cryptography (ITC 2025)},
  pages =	{1:1--1:23},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-385-0},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{343},
  editor =	{Gilboa, Niv},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.1},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-243518},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITC.2025.1},
  annote =	{Keywords: Amortized Locally Decodable Codes, Insertion and Deletion Errors}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.CCC.2025.13

Tight Bounds for Stream Decodable Error-Correcting Codes

Authors: Meghal Gupta, Venkatesan Guruswami, and Mihir Singhal

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 339, 40th Computational Complexity Conference (CCC 2025)

Abstract

In order to communicate a message over a noisy channel, a sender (Alice) uses an error-correcting code to encode her message, a bitstring x, into a codeword. The receiver (Bob) decodes x correctly whenever there is at most a small constant fraction of adversarial errors in the transmitted codeword. We investigate the setting where Bob is restricted to be a low-space streaming algorithm. Specifically, Bob receives the message as a stream and must process it and write x in order to a write-only tape while using low (say polylogarithmic) space. Note that such a primitive then allows the execution of any downstream streaming computation on x. We show three basic results about this setting, which are informally as follows: [(i)] 1) There is a stream decodable code of near-quadratic length, resilient to error-fractions approaching the optimal bound of 1/4. 2) There is no stream decodable code of sub-quadratic length, even to correct any small constant fraction of errors. 3) If Bob need only compute a private linear function of the bits of x, instead of writing them all to the output tape, there is a stream decodable code of near-linear length. Our constructions use locally decodable codes with additional functionality in the decoding, and (for the result on linear functions) repeated tensoring. Our lower bound, which rather surprisingly demonstrates a strong information-theoretic limitation originating from a computational restriction, proceeds via careful control of the message indices that may be output during successive blocks of the stream, a task complicated by the arbitrary state of the decoder during the algorithm.

Cite as

Meghal Gupta, Venkatesan Guruswami, and Mihir Singhal. Tight Bounds for Stream Decodable Error-Correcting Codes. In 40th Computational Complexity Conference (CCC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 339, pp. 13:1-13:17, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{gupta_et_al:LIPIcs.CCC.2025.13,
  author =	{Gupta, Meghal and Guruswami, Venkatesan and Singhal, Mihir},
  title =	{{Tight Bounds for Stream Decodable Error-Correcting Codes}},
  booktitle =	{40th Computational Complexity Conference (CCC 2025)},
  pages =	{13:1--13:17},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-379-9},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{339},
  editor =	{Srinivasan, Srikanth},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.CCC.2025.13},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-237072},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.CCC.2025.13},
  annote =	{Keywords: Coding theory, Streaming computation, Locally decodable code, Lower Bounds}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.FORC.2025.8

Differential Privacy Under Multiple Selections

Authors: Ashish Goel, Zhihao Jiang, Aleksandra Korolova, Kamesh Munagala, and Sahasrajit Sarmasarkar

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 329, 6th Symposium on Foundations of Responsible Computing (FORC 2025)

Abstract

We consider the setting where a user with sensitive features wishes to obtain a recommendation from a server in a differentially private fashion. We propose a "multi-selection" architecture where the server can send back multiple recommendations and the user chooses one from these that matches best with their private features. When the user feature is one-dimensional - on an infinite line - and the accuracy measure is defined w.r.t some increasing function 𝔥(.) of the distance on the line, we precisely characterize the optimal mechanism that satisfies differential privacy. The specification of the optimal mechanism includes both the distribution of the noise that the user adds to its private value, and the algorithm used by the server to determine the set of results to send back as a response. We show that Laplace is an optimal noise distribution in this setting. Furthermore, we show that this optimal mechanism results in an error that is inversely proportional to the number of results returned when the function 𝔥(.) is the identity function.

Cite as

Ashish Goel, Zhihao Jiang, Aleksandra Korolova, Kamesh Munagala, and Sahasrajit Sarmasarkar. Differential Privacy Under Multiple Selections. In 6th Symposium on Foundations of Responsible Computing (FORC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 329, pp. 8:1-8:25, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{goel_et_al:LIPIcs.FORC.2025.8,
  author =	{Goel, Ashish and Jiang, Zhihao and Korolova, Aleksandra and Munagala, Kamesh and Sarmasarkar, Sahasrajit},
  title =	{{Differential Privacy Under Multiple Selections}},
  booktitle =	{6th Symposium on Foundations of Responsible Computing (FORC 2025)},
  pages =	{8:1--8:25},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-367-6},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{329},
  editor =	{Bun, Mark},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.FORC.2025.8},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-231353},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.FORC.2025.8},
  annote =	{Keywords: Differential Privacy, Mechanism Design and Multi-Selection}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.STACS.2025.58

Violating Constant Degree Hypothesis Requires Breaking Symmetry

Authors: Piotr Kawałek and Armin Weiß

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 327, 42nd International Symposium on Theoretical Aspects of Computer Science (STACS 2025)

Abstract

The Constant Degree Hypothesis was introduced by Barrington et. al. [David A. Mix Barrington et al., 1990] to study some extensions of q-groups by nilpotent groups and the power of these groups in a computation model called NuDFA (non-uniform DFA). In its simplest formulation, it establishes exponential lower bounds for MOD_q∘MOD_m∘AND_d circuits computing AND of unbounded arity n (for constant integers d,m and a prime q). While it has been proved in some special cases (including d = 1), it remains wide open in its general form for over 30 years. In this paper we prove that the hypothesis holds when we restrict our attention to symmetric circuits with m being a prime. While we build upon techniques by Grolmusz and Tardos [Vince Grolmusz and Gábor Tardos, 2000], we have to prove a new symmetric version of their Degree Decreasing Lemma and use it to simplify circuits in a symmetry-preserving way. Moreover, to establish the result, we perform a careful analysis of automorphism groups of MOD_m∘AND_d subcircuits and study the periodic behaviour of the computed functions. Our methods also yield lower bounds when d is treated as a function of n. Finally, we present a construction of symmetric MOD_q∘MOD_m∘AND_d circuits that almost matches our lower bound and conclude that a symmetric function f can be computed by symmetric MOD_q∘MOD_p∘AND_d circuits of quasipolynomial size if and only if f has periods of polylogarithmic length of the form p^k q^𝓁.

Cite as

Piotr Kawałek and Armin Weiß. Violating Constant Degree Hypothesis Requires Breaking Symmetry. In 42nd International Symposium on Theoretical Aspects of Computer Science (STACS 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 327, pp. 58:1-58:21, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{kawalek_et_al:LIPIcs.STACS.2025.58,
  author =	{Kawa{\l}ek, Piotr and Wei{\ss}, Armin},
  title =	{{Violating Constant Degree Hypothesis Requires Breaking Symmetry}},
  booktitle =	{42nd International Symposium on Theoretical Aspects of Computer Science (STACS 2025)},
  pages =	{58:1--58:21},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-365-2},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{327},
  editor =	{Beyersdorff, Olaf and Pilipczuk, Micha{\l} and Pimentel, Elaine and Thắng, Nguy\~{ê}n Kim},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.STACS.2025.58},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-228837},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.STACS.2025.58},
  annote =	{Keywords: Circuit lower bounds, constant degree hypothesis, permutation groups, CC⁰-circuits}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.39

Data Reconstruction: When You See It and When You Don't

Authors: Edith Cohen, Haim Kaplan, Yishay Mansour, Shay Moran, Kobbi Nissim, Uri Stemmer, and Eliad Tsfadia

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 325, 16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025)

Abstract

We revisit the fundamental question of formally defining what constitutes a reconstruction attack. While often clear from the context, our exploration reveals that a precise definition is much more nuanced than it appears, to the extent that a single all-encompassing definition may not exist. Thus, we employ a different strategy and aim to "sandwich" the concept of reconstruction attacks by addressing two complementing questions: (i) What conditions guarantee that a given system is protected against such attacks? (ii) Under what circumstances does a given attack clearly indicate that a system is not protected? More specifically, - We introduce a new definitional paradigm - Narcissus Resiliency - to formulate a security definition for protection against reconstruction attacks. This paradigm has a self-referential nature that enables it to circumvent shortcomings of previously studied notions of security. Furthermore, as a side-effect, we demonstrate that Narcissus resiliency captures as special cases multiple well-studied concepts including differential privacy and other security notions of one-way functions and encryption schemes. - We formulate a link between reconstruction attacks and Kolmogorov complexity. This allows us to put forward a criterion for evaluating when such attacks are convincingly successful.

Cite as

Edith Cohen, Haim Kaplan, Yishay Mansour, Shay Moran, Kobbi Nissim, Uri Stemmer, and Eliad Tsfadia. Data Reconstruction: When You See It and When You Don't. In 16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 325, pp. 39:1-39:23, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{cohen_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.39,
  author =	{Cohen, Edith and Kaplan, Haim and Mansour, Yishay and Moran, Shay and Nissim, Kobbi and Stemmer, Uri and Tsfadia, Eliad},
  title =	{{Data Reconstruction: When You See It and When You Don't}},
  booktitle =	{16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025)},
  pages =	{39:1--39:23},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-361-4},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{325},
  editor =	{Meka, Raghu},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.39},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-226674},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.39},
  annote =	{Keywords: differential privacy, reconstruction}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.2

Improved Lower Bounds for 3-Query Matching Vector Codes

Authors: Divesh Aggarwal, Pranjal Dutta, Zeyong Li, Maciej Obremski, and Sidhant Saraogi

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 325, 16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025)

Abstract

A Matching Vector (MV) family modulo a positive integer m ≥ 2 is a pair of ordered lists U = (u_1, ⋯, u_K) and V = (v_1, ⋯, v_K) where u_i, v_j ∈ ℤ_m^n with the following property: for any i ∈ [K], the inner product ⟨u_i, v_i⟩ = 0 mod m, and for any i ≠ j, ⟨u_i, v_j⟩ ≠ 0 mod m. An MV family is called r-restricted if inner products ⟨u_i, v_j⟩, for all i,j, take at most r different values. The r-restricted MV families are extremely important since the only known construction of constant-query subexponential locally decodable codes (LDCs) are based on them. Such LDCs constructed via matching vector families are called matching vector codes. Let MV(m,n) (respectively MV(m, n, r)) denote the largest K such that there exists an MV family (respectively r-restricted MV family) of size K in ℤ_m^n. Such a MV family can be transformed in a black-box manner to a good r-query locally decodable code taking messages of length K to codewords of length N = m^n. For small prime m, an almost tight bound MV(m,n) ≤ O(m^{n/2}) was first shown by Dvir, Gopalan, Yekhanin (FOCS'10, SICOMP'11), while for general m, the same paper established an upper bound of O(m^{n-1+o_m(1)}), with o_m(1) denoting a function that goes to zero when m grows. For any arbitrary constant r ≥ 3 and composite m, the best upper bound till date on MV(m,n,r) is O(m^{n/2}), is due to Bhowmick, Dvir and Lovett (STOC'13, SICOMP'14).In a breakthrough work, Alrabiah, Guruswami, Kothari and Manohar (STOC'23) implicitly improve this bound for 3-restricted families to MV(m, n, 3) ≤ O(m^{n/3}). In this work, we present an upper bound for r = 3 where MV(m,n,3) ≤ m^{n/6 +O(log n)}, and as a result, any 3-query matching vector code must have codeword length of N ≥ K^{6-o(1)}.

Cite as

Divesh Aggarwal, Pranjal Dutta, Zeyong Li, Maciej Obremski, and Sidhant Saraogi. Improved Lower Bounds for 3-Query Matching Vector Codes. In 16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 325, pp. 2:1-2:19, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

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@InProceedings{aggarwal_et_al:LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.2,
  author =	{Aggarwal, Divesh and Dutta, Pranjal and Li, Zeyong and Obremski, Maciej and Saraogi, Sidhant},
  title =	{{Improved Lower Bounds for 3-Query Matching Vector Codes}},
  booktitle =	{16th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science Conference (ITCS 2025)},
  pages =	{2:1--2:19},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-361-4},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{325},
  editor =	{Meka, Raghu},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.2},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-226308},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ITCS.2025.2},
  annote =	{Keywords: Locally Decodable Codes, Matching Vector Families}
}

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