Differentially private nonlinear observer design using contraction analysis. (12th November 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Le Ny, Jerome
• Other Names: Chen Jiming guestEditor.; Gupta Vijay guestEditor.; Quevedo Daniel E. guestEditor.; Tesi Pietro guestEditor.
• Is Part Of: International journal of robust and nonlinear control. Volume 30:Number 11(2020)
• Page Start: 4225
• Page End: 4243
• Publication Date: 2018-11-12
• Subjects: differential privacy -- nonlinear filtering -- nonlinear observer design -- privacy‐preserving data analysis; Automatic control -- Periodicals; Control theory -- Periodicals; Nonlinear systems -- Periodicals; 629.836
• DOI: 10.1002/rnc.4392
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1049-8923

Abstract

Summary: Real‐time information processing applications such as those enabling a more intelligent infrastructure are increasingly focused on analyzing privacy‐sensitive data obtained from individuals. To produce accurate statistics about the habits of a population of users of a system, this data might need to be processed through model‐based estimators. Moreover, models of population dynamics, originating for example from epidemiology or the social sciences, are often necessarily nonlinear. Motivated by these trends, this paper presents an approach to design nonlinear privacy‐preserving model‐based observers, relying on additive input or output noise to give differential privacy guarantees to the individuals providing the input data. For the case of output perturbation, contraction analysis allows us to design convergent observers as well as set the level of privacy‐preserving noise appropriately. Two examples illustrate the proposed approach: estimating the edge formation probabilities in a social network using a dynamic stochastic block model, and syndromic surveillance relying on an epidemiological model.