pwc-archive/papers-with-abstracts huggingface dataset:
GenTel-Safe: A Unified Benchmark and Shielding Framework for Defending Against Prompt Injection Attacks
Authors: Rongchang Li, Minjie Chen, Chang Hu, Han Chen, Wenpeng Xing, Meng Han
Date: 2024-09-29 00:00:00
Tasks: Benchmarking

Large Language Models (LLMs) like GPT-4, LLaMA, and Qwen have demonstrated remarkable success across a wide range of applications. However, these models remain inherently vulnerable to prompt injection attacks, which can bypass existing safety mechanisms, highlighting the urgent need for more robust attack detection methods and comprehensive evaluation benchmarks. To address these challenges, we introduce GenTel-Safe, a unified framework that includes a novel prompt injection attack detection method, GenTel-Shield, along with a comprehensive evaluation benchmark, GenTel-Bench, which compromises 84812 prompt injection attacks, spanning 3 major categories and 28 security scenarios. To prove the effectiveness of GenTel-Shield, we evaluate it together with vanilla safety guardrails against the GenTel-Bench dataset. Empirically, GenTel-Shield can achieve state-of-the-art attack detection success rates, which reveals the critical weakness of existing safeguarding techniques against harmful prompts. For reproducibility, we have made the code and benchmarking dataset available on the project page at https://gentellab.github.io/gentel-safe.github.io/.
Hedging and Approximate Truthfulness in Traditional Forecasting Competitions
Authors: Mary Monroe, Anish Thilagar, Melody Hsu, Rafael Frongillo
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00

In forecasting competitions, the traditional mechanism scores the predictions of each contestant against the outcome of each event, and the contestant with the highest total score wins. While it is well-known that this traditional mechanism can suffer from incentive issues, it is folklore that contestants will still be roughly truthful as the number of events grows. Yet thus far the literature lacks a formal analysis of this traditional mechanism. This paper gives the first such analysis. We first demonstrate that the ''long-run truthfulness'' folklore is false: even for arbitrary numbers of events, the best forecaster can have an incentive to hedge, reporting more moderate beliefs to increase their win probability. On the positive side, however, we show that two contestants will be approximately truthful when they have sufficient uncertainty over the relative quality of their opponent and the outcomes of the events, a case which may arise in practice.
Energy-Efficient Computation with DVFS using Deep Reinforcement Learning for Multi-Task Systems in Edge Computing
Authors: Xinyi Li, Ti Zhou, Haoyu Wang, Man Lin
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00
Tasks: Deep Reinforcement Learning, Edge-computing, reinforcement-learning, Reinforcement Learning

Finding an optimal energy-efficient policy that is adaptable to underlying edge devices while meeting deadlines for tasks has always been challenging. This research studies generalized systems with multi-task, multi-deadline scenarios with reinforcement learning-based DVFS for energy saving for periodic soft real-time applications on edge devices. This work addresses the limitation of previous work that models a periodic system as a single task and single-deadline scenario, which is too simplified to cope with complex situations. The method encodes time series data in the Linux kernel into information that is easy to interpret for reinforcement learning, allowing the system to generate DVFS policies to adapt system patterns based on the general workload. For encoding, we present two different methods for comparison. Both methods use only one performance counter: system utilization, and the kernel only needs minimal information from the userspace. Our method is implemented on Jetson Nano Board (2GB) and is tested with three fixed multitask workloads, which are three, five, and eight tasks in the workload, respectively. For randomness and generalization, we also designed a random workload generator to build different multitask workloads to test. Based on the test results, our method could save 3%-10% power compared to Linux built-in governors.
A Proximal Modified Quasi-Newton Method for Nonsmooth Regularized Optimization
Authors: Youssef Diouane, Mohamed Laghdaf Habiboullah, Dominique Orban
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00
Tasks: Denoising, Image Denoising, Matrix Completion

We develop R2N, a modified quasi-Newton method for minimizing the sum of a $\mathcal{C}^1$ function $f$ and a lower semi-continuous prox-bounded $h$. Both $f$ and $h$ may be nonconvex. At each iteration, our method computes a step by minimizing the sum of a quadratic model of $f$, a model of $h$, and an adaptive quadratic regularization term. A step may be computed by a variant of the proximal-gradient method. An advantage of R2N over trust-region (TR) methods is that proximal operators do not involve an extra TR indicator. We also develop the variant R2DH, in which the model Hessian is diagonal, which allows us to compute a step without relying on a subproblem solver when $h$ is separable. R2DH can be used as standalone solver, but also as subproblem solver inside R2N. We describe non-monotone variants of both R2N and R2DH. Global convergence of a first-order stationarity measure to zero holds without relying on local Lipschitz continuity of $\nabla f$, while allowing model Hessians to grow unbounded, an assumption particularly relevant to quasi-Newton models. Under Lipschitz-continuity of $\nabla f$, we establish a tight worst-case complexity bound of $O(1 / \epsilon^{2/(1 - p)})$ to bring said measure below $\epsilon > 0$, where $0 \leq p < 1$ controls the growth of model Hessians. The latter must not diverge faster than $|\mathcal{S}_k|^p$, where $\mathcal{S}_k$ is the set of successful iterations up to iteration $k$. When $p = 1$, we establish the tight exponential complexity bound $O(\exp(c \epsilon^{-2}))$ where $c > 0$ is a constant. We describe our Julia implementation and report numerical experience on a basis-pursuit problem, image denoising, minimum-rank matrix completion, and a nonlinear support vector machine. In particular, the minimum-rank problem cannot be solved directly at this time by a TR approach as corresponding proximal operators are not known analytically.
Machine Learning Operations: A Mapping Study
Authors: Abhijit Chakraborty, Suddhasvatta Das, Kevin Gary
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00

Machine learning and AI have been recently embraced by many companies. Machine Learning Operations, (MLOps), refers to the use of continuous software engineering processes, such as DevOps, in the deployment of machine learning models to production. Nevertheless, not all machine learning initiatives successfully transition to the production stage owing to the multitude of intricate factors involved. This article discusses the issues that exist in several components of the MLOps pipeline, namely the data manipulation pipeline, model building pipeline, and deployment pipeline. A systematic mapping study is performed to identify the challenges that arise in the MLOps system categorized by different focus areas. Using this data, realistic and applicable recommendations are offered for tools or solutions that can be used for their implementation. The main value of this work is it maps distinctive challenges in MLOps along with the recommended solutions outlined in our study. These guidelines are not specific to any particular tool and are applicable to both research and industrial settings.
Sequential Signal Mixing Aggregation for Message Passing Graph Neural Networks
Authors: Mitchell Keren Taraday, Almog David, Chaim Baskin
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00

Message Passing Graph Neural Networks (MPGNNs) have emerged as the preferred method for modeling complex interactions across diverse graph entities. While the theory of such models is well understood, their aggregation module has not received sufficient attention. Sum-based aggregators have solid theoretical foundations regarding their separation capabilities. However, practitioners often prefer using more complex aggregations and mixtures of diverse aggregations. In this work, we unveil a possible explanation for this gap. We claim that sum-based aggregators fail to "mix" features belonging to distinct neighbors, preventing them from succeeding at downstream tasks. To this end, we introduce Sequential Signal Mixing Aggregation (SSMA), a novel plug-and-play aggregation for MPGNNs. SSMA treats the neighbor features as 2D discrete signals and sequentially convolves them, inherently enhancing the ability to mix features attributed to distinct neighbors. By performing extensive experiments, we show that when combining SSMA with well-established MPGNN architectures, we achieve substantial performance gains across various benchmarks, achieving new state-of-the-art results in many settings. We published our code at \url{https://almogdavid.github.io/SSMA/}
Value-Based Deep Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning with Dynamic Sparse Training
Authors: Pihe Hu, Shaolong Li, Zhuoran Li, Ling Pan, Longbo Huang
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00
Tasks: Model Compression, Multi-agent Reinforcement Learning

Deep Multi-agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) relies on neural networks with numerous parameters in multi-agent scenarios, often incurring substantial computational overhead. Consequently, there is an urgent need to expedite training and enable model compression in MARL. This paper proposes the utilization of dynamic sparse training (DST), a technique proven effective in deep supervised learning tasks, to alleviate the computational burdens in MARL training. However, a direct adoption of DST fails to yield satisfactory MARL agents, leading to breakdowns in value learning within deep sparse value-based MARL models. Motivated by this challenge, we introduce an innovative Multi-Agent Sparse Training (MAST) framework aimed at simultaneously enhancing the reliability of learning targets and the rationality of sample distribution to improve value learning in sparse models. Specifically, MAST incorporates the Soft Mellowmax Operator with a hybrid TD-($\lambda$) schema to establish dependable learning targets. Additionally, it employs a dual replay buffer mechanism to enhance the distribution of training samples. Building upon these aspects, MAST utilizes gradient-based topology evolution to exclusively train multiple MARL agents using sparse networks. Our comprehensive experimental investigation across various value-based MARL algorithms on multiple benchmarks demonstrates, for the first time, significant reductions in redundancy of up to $20\times$ in Floating Point Operations (FLOPs) for both training and inference, with less than $3\%$ performance degradation.
Quantum delegated and federated learning via quantum homomorphic encryption
Authors: Weikang Li, Dong-Ling Deng
Date: 2024-09-28 00:00:00
Tasks: Federated Learning

Quantum learning models hold the potential to bring computational advantages over the classical realm. As powerful quantum servers become available on the cloud, ensuring the protection of clients' private data becomes crucial. By incorporating quantum homomorphic encryption schemes, we present a general framework that enables quantum delegated and federated learning with a computation-theoretical data privacy guarantee. We show that learning and inference under this framework feature substantially lower communication complexity compared with schemes based on blind quantum computing. In addition, in the proposed quantum federated learning scenario, there is less computational burden on local quantum devices from the client side, since the server can operate on encrypted quantum data without extracting any information. We further prove that certain quantum speedups in supervised learning carry over to private delegated learning scenarios employing quantum kernel methods. Our results provide a valuable guide toward privacy-guaranteed quantum learning on the cloud, which may benefit future studies and security-related applications.
Retro-li: Small-Scale Retrieval Augmented Generation Supporting Noisy Similarity Searches and Domain Shift Generalization
Authors: Gentiana Rashiti, Geethan Karunaratne, Mrinmaya Sachan, Abu Sebastian, Abbas Rahimi
Date: 2024-09-12 00:00:00
Tasks: Language Modeling, Language Modelling, RAG, Retrieval, Retrieval-augmented Generation, Semantic Similarity, Semantic Textual Similarity

The retrieval augmented generation (RAG) system such as Retro has been shown to improve language modeling capabilities and reduce toxicity and hallucinations by retrieving from a database of non-parametric memory containing trillions of entries. We introduce Retro-li that shows retrieval can also help using a small-scale database, but it demands more accurate and better neighbors when searching in a smaller hence sparser non-parametric memory. This can be met by using a proper semantic similarity search. We further propose adding a regularization to the non-parametric memory for the first time: it significantly reduces perplexity when the neighbor search operations are noisy during inference, and it improves generalization when a domain shift occurs. We also show that Retro-li's non-parametric memory can potentially be implemented on analog in-memory computing hardware, exhibiting O(1) search time while causing noise in retrieving neighbors, with minimal (<1%) performance loss. Our code is available at: https://github.com/IBM/Retrieval-Enhanced-Transformer-Little.
Strategic Collusion of LLM Agents: Market Division in Multi-Commodity Competitions
Authors: Ryan Y. Lin, Siddhartha Ojha, Kevin Cai, Maxwell F. Chen
Date: 2024-09-19 00:00:00

Machine-learning technologies are seeing increased deployment in real-world market scenarios. In this work, we explore the strategic behaviors of large language models (LLMs) when deployed as autonomous agents in multi-commodity markets, specifically within Cournot competition frameworks. We examine whether LLMs can independently engage in anti-competitive practices such as collusion or, more specifically, market division. Our findings demonstrate that LLMs can effectively monopolize specific commodities by dynamically adjusting their pricing and resource allocation strategies, thereby maximizing profitability without direct human input or explicit collusion commands. These results pose unique challenges and opportunities for businesses looking to integrate AI into strategic roles and for regulatory bodies tasked with maintaining fair and competitive markets. The study provides a foundation for further exploration into the ramifications of deferring high-stakes decisions to LLM-based agents.
Enabling Synergistic Full-Body Control in Prompt-Based Co-Speech Motion Generation
Authors: Bohong Chen, Yumeng Li, Yao-Xiang Ding, Tianjia Shao, Kun Zhou
Date: 2024-10-01 00:00:00
Proceeding: ACMMM24 2024 10
Tasks: Gesture Generation, Motion Generation

Current co-speech motion generation approaches usually focus on upper body gestures following speech contents only, while lacking supporting the elaborate control of synergistic full-body motion based on text prompts, such as talking while walking. The major challenges lie in 1) the existing speech-to-motion datasets only involve highly limited full-body motions, making a wide range of common human activities out of training distribution; 2) these datasets also lack annotated user prompts. To address these challenges, we propose SynTalker, which utilizes the off-the-shelf text-to-motion dataset as an auxiliary for supplementing the missing full-body motion and prompts. The core technical contributions are two-fold. One is the multi-stage training process which obtains an aligned embedding space of motion, speech, and prompts despite the significant distributional mismatch in motion between speech-to-motion and text-to-motion datasets. Another is the diffusion-based conditional inference process, which utilizes the separate-then-combine strategy to realize fine-grained control of local body parts. Extensive experiments are conducted to verify that our approach supports precise and flexible control of synergistic full-body motion generation based on both speeches and user prompts, which is beyond the ability of existing approaches.
ISP: Multi-Layered Garment Draping with Implicit Sewing Patterns
Authors: Ren Li, Benoît Guillard, Pascal Fua
Date: 2023-05-23 00:00:00
Proceeding: NeurIPS 2023 11

Many approaches to draping individual garments on human body models are realistic, fast, and yield outputs that are differentiable with respect to the body shape on which they are draped. However, they are either unable to handle multi-layered clothing, which is prevalent in everyday dress, or restricted to bodies in T-pose. In this paper, we introduce a parametric garment representation model that addresses these limitations. As in models used by clothing designers, each garment consists of individual 2D panels. Their 2D shape is defined by a Signed Distance Function and 3D shape by a 2D to 3D mapping. The 2D parameterization enables easy detection of potential collisions and the 3D parameterization handles complex shapes effectively. We show that this combination is faster and yields higher quality reconstructions than purely implicit surface representations, and makes the recovery of layered garments from images possible thanks to its differentiability. Furthermore, it supports rapid editing of garment shapes and texture by modifying individual 2D panels.
"Show Me What's Wrong!": Combining Charts and Text to Guide Data Analysis
Authors: Beatriz Feliciano, Rita Costa, Jean Alves, Javier Liébana, Diogo Duarte, Pedro Bizarro
Date: 2024-10-01 00:00:00
Tasks: Fraud Detection, Language Modeling, Language Modelling, Large Language Model

Analyzing and finding anomalies in multi-dimensional datasets is a cumbersome but vital task across different domains. In the context of financial fraud detection, analysts must quickly identify suspicious activity among transactional data. This is an iterative process made of complex exploratory tasks such as recognizing patterns, grouping, and comparing. To mitigate the information overload inherent to these steps, we present a tool combining automated information highlights, Large Language Model generated textual insights, and visual analytics, facilitating exploration at different levels of detail. We perform a segmentation of the data per analysis area and visually represent each one, making use of automated visual cues to signal which require more attention. Upon user selection of an area, our system provides textual and graphical summaries. The text, acting as a link between the high-level and detailed views of the chosen segment, allows for a quick understanding of relevant details. A thorough exploration of the data comprising the selection can be done through graphical representations. The feedback gathered in a study performed with seven domain experts suggests our tool effectively supports and guides exploratory analysis, easing the identification of suspicious information.
Image-Based and Partially Categorical Annotating Approach for Pedestrian Attribute Recognition
Authors: Hossein Bodaghi, Farbod Siahkali, Shayan Samiee, Seraj Ghasemi, Mehdi Tale Masouleh, Ahmad Kalhor
Date: 2023-02-28 00:00:00
Proceeding: SSRN 2023 2
Tasks: Attribute, Multi-Task Learning, Pedestrian Attribute Recognition, Person Re-Identification

Textual searches can be added to a person re-Identification (re-ID) surveillance system using Pedestrian Attribute Recognition (PAR). Adding a CNN-based PAR module to a re-ID model is efficient for both tasks, albeit few approaches have concentrated on modifying the data rather than the model to improve the outcomes. Without considering the cost of computing, the difficulty of deployment, or the generalizability, most contemporary multi-task methods attempt to outperform the prior methods using new models and architectures on fixed datasets. In order to examine the impact of data on the PAR result, this research suggests an image-based partially categorical attribute dataset (CA-Duke) including 36,411 images of the DukeMTMC-reID dataset for 74 pedestrian attributes. However, a systematic approach in order to determine the best location for new branches remains unclear since today's methods choose the location for additional modules on the baselines to build a multi-task network through an experimental process. In order to identify the best place to add a PAR module to a re-ID pre-trained network, this study also proposes a two-step learning method for evaluating the separability of data in the latent space via a new metric called the Separation Index (SI). Finally, extensive experiments on the attribute recognition and retrieval results indicate that comprehensive and image-based annotation can increase network proficiency by 3.31% with respect to the F1 metric. Furthermore, SI and pre-trained networks can achieve state-of-the-art performance on PAR.
Credit Card Fraud Detection: A Deep Learning Approach
Authors: Sourav Verma, Joydip Dhar
Date: 2024-09-20 00:00:00
Tasks: Deep Learning, Fraud Detection

Credit card is one of the most extensive methods of instalment for both online and offline mode of payment for electronic transactions in recent times. credit cards invention has provided significant ease in electronic transactions. However, it has also provided new fraud opportunities for criminals, which results in increased fraud rates. Substantial amount of money has been lost by many institutions and individuals due to fraudulent credit card transactions. Adapting improved and dynamic fraud recognition frameworks thus became essential for all credit card distributing banks to mitigate their losses. In fact, the problem of fraudulent credit card transactions implicates a number of relevant real-time challenges, namely: Concept drift, Class imbalance, and Verification latency. However, the vast majority of current systems are based on artificial intelligence (AI), Fuzzy logic, Machine Learning, Data mining, Genetic Algorithms, and so on, rely on assumptions that hardly address all the relevant challenges of fraud-detection system (FDS). This paper aims to understand & implement Deep Learning algorithms in order to obtain a high fraud coverage with very low false positive rate. Also, it aims to implement an auto-encoder as an unsupervised (semi-supervised) method of learning common patterns. Keywords: Credit card fraud, Fraud-detection system (FDS), Electronic transactions, Concept drift, Class imbalance, Verification latency, Machine Learning, Deep Learning
Artificial intelligence-based blockchain-driven financial default prediction
Authors: Junjun Huang
Date: 2024-09-27 00:00:00
Tasks: Management, Prediction

With the rapid development of technology, blockchain and artificial intelligence technology are playing a huge role in all walks of life. In the financial sector, blockchain solves many security problems in data storage and management in traditional systems with its advantages of decentralization and security. And artificial intelligence has huge advantages in financial forecasting and risk management through its powerful algorithmic modeling capabilities. In financial default prediction using blockchain and artificial intelligence technology is a very powerful application. Blockchain technology guarantees the credibility of data and consistency on all nodes, and machine learning builds a high-level default prediction model through detailed analysis of big data. This study offers financial institutions new thoughts on financial technology in terms of credit risk mitigation and financial system stabilization.