arXiv Machine Learning

On the Relationship between Model Quantization and Model Inversion Attacks

The paper investigates how reducing numerical precision through model quantization impacts the vulnerability of neural networks to model inversion attacks. It provides theoretical bounds on mutual information changes and identifies data-dependent effects, especially at 4‑bit precision. Based on these findings, the authors propose a privacy‑aware post‑training quantization strategy that allocates bits adaptively, calibrates activation ranges, and jointly optimizes weight and activation scaling to improve inversion resistance while preserving model utility.

arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 2

Profiling Privacy Preservation Against Gradient Inversion Attacks in Tabular Federated Learning

arXiv:2606. 00986v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Federated learning (FL) enables multiple data holders to train machine learning models collaboratively without centralizing raw data, making it useful in privacy sensitive domains such as healthcare and institutional data sharing.

By Ivo Osterberg Nilsson, Maximilian Birr Engvall, Viktor Valadi, Teddy Lazebnik
arXiv Computer Vision
Sep 21

Privacy Leakage on DNNs: A Survey of Model Inversion Attacks and Defenses

The paper "Privacy Leakage on DNNs: A Survey of Model Inversion Attacks and Defenses" provides a comprehensive review of model inversion (MI) attacks that exploit trained deep neural networks to reconstruct private training data. It traces the evolution of MI from early machine‑learning contexts to recent DNN‑based attacks across various modalities and learning tasks, offering a detailed taxonomy and comparative analysis of both attacks and defenses. The authors also present an open‑source toolbox on GitHub to support further research in this area.

By Hao Fang, Yixiang Qiu, Hongyao Yu, Wenbo Yu, Jiawei Kong, Baoli Chong, Bin Chen, Xuan Wang, Shu-Tao Xia, Ke Xu
arXiv Computer Vision
Sep 18

Fast Preemptive Robustification: High-Frequency Response Anti-Aligns Shared Vulnerability

The paper introduces Fast Preemptive Robustification (FPR), a lightweight defense that enhances the robustness of deep neural networks against transferable adversarial attacks. By sharpening Laplacian responses through a single 3×3 channel‑wise convolution, FPR eliminates the need for surrogate models, iterative optimization, or specialized training. Experiments show that FPR lowers untargeted attack success rates by 12.7% and reduces targeted attack success from 10.7% to 4.1%.

By Jiaming Liang, Chi-Man Pun
arXiv AI
Jun 4

Recover-LoRA for Aggressive Quantization: Reclaiming Accuracy in 2-Bit Language Models via Low-Rank Adaptation with Knowledge Distillation on Synthetic Data

arXiv:2606. 04238v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Aggressive weight quantization to 2-bit precision offers substantial throughput and memory gains for large language model (LLM) inference, but typically incurs severe accuracy degradation.

By Devleena Das, Rajeev Patwari, Elliott Delaye, Ashish Sirasao
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 2

The Structure of Quantization Damage in LLMs: Why the Next Bit Should Be Spent Globally

The paper investigates where post‑training quantization (PTQ) harms large language models (LLMs) and how to best allocate a limited precision budget. By causally raising each layer to 8‑bit precision across nine open‑weight models, the authors find that quantization damage is diffuse rather than concentrated in specific task circuits or weight statistics, and that globally refining quantization granularity outperforms selectively protecting the most recoverable layers. They also observe that the residual accuracy loss is budget‑limited and that peak recovery locations correlate with architecture within families but not across families.

By Jundong Hu, Shekar Ramachandran
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 25

AERIAL: Adversarial Evaluation of Robustness in Accuracy-Preserving Low-Precision EEG Decoders

The study evaluates how low‑precision compression affects adversarial robustness in EEG decoders used for brain‑computer interfaces. Using BCI Competition IV‑2a data, the authors compare 32‑bit floating‑point models (EEGNet and ShallowConvNet) with models pruned to 50 % and quantized to INT8 via post‑training quantization (PTQ) or quantization‑aware training (QAT). Results show that accuracy‑preserving compression does not improve direct robustness—PGD attack accuracy remains 22–24 % across all variants—yet pruning reduces bidirectional transfer efficiency more than PTQ, indicating that robustness, transferability, and deployment efficiency are distinct properties of compressed EEG decoders.

By Saim Rehman, Muhammad Shafique