Communication-constrained hypothesis testing: Optimality, robustness, and reverse data processing inequalities

We study hypothesis testing under communication constraints, where each sample is quantized before being revealed to a statistician. Without communication constraints, it is well known that the sample complexity of simple binary hypothesis testing is characterized by the Hellinger distance between the distributions. We show that the sample complexity of simple binary hypothesis testing under communication constraints is at most a logarithmic factor larger than in the unconstrained setting and this bound is tight. We develop a polynomial-time algorithm that achieves the aforementioned sample complexity. Our framework extends to robust hypothesis testing, where the distributions are corrupted in the total variation distance. Our proofs rely on a new reverse data processing inequality and a reverse Markov inequality, which may be of independent interest. For simple $M$-ary hypothesis testing, the sample complexity in the absence of communication constraints has a logarithmic dependence on $M$. We show that communication constraints can cause an exponential blow-up leading to $\Omega(M)$ sample complexity even for adaptive algorithms.Comment: To appear in IEEE Transactions on Information Theor

Distributed Hypothesis Testing with Privacy Constraints

We revisit the distributed hypothesis testing (or hypothesis testing with communication constraints) problem from the viewpoint of privacy. Instead of observing the raw data directly, the transmitter observes a sanitized or randomized version of it. We impose an upper bound on the mutual information between the raw and randomized data. Under this scenario, the receiver, which is also provided with side information, is required to make a decision on whether the null or alternative hypothesis is in effect. We first provide a general lower bound on the type-II exponent for an arbitrary pair of hypotheses. Next, we show that if the distribution under the alternative hypothesis is the product of the marginals of the distribution under the null (i.e., testing against independence), then the exponent is known exactly. Moreover, we show that the strong converse property holds. Using ideas from Euclidean information theory, we also provide an approximate expression for the exponent when the communication rate is low and the privacy level is high. Finally, we illustrate our results with a binary and a Gaussian example

Optimal high-dimensional and nonparametric distributed testing under communication constraints

We derive minimax testing errors in a distributed framework where the data is split over multiple machines and their communication to a central machine is limited to b bits. We investigate both the d- and infinite-dimensional signal detection problem under Gaussian white noise. We also derive distributed testing algorithms reaching the theoretical lower bounds. Our results show that distributed testing is subject to fundamentally different phenomena that are not observed in distributed estimation. Among our findings, we show that testing protocols that have access to shared randomness can perform strictly better in some regimes than those that do not. We also observe that consistent nonparametric distributed testing is always possible, even with as little as 1-bit of communication and the corresponding test outperforms the best local test using only the information available at a single local machine. Furthermore, we also derive adaptive nonparametric distributed testing strategies and the corresponding theoretical lower bound

Simple Binary Hypothesis Testing under Local Differential Privacy and Communication Constraints

We study simple binary hypothesis testing under both local differential privacy (LDP) and communication constraints. We qualify our results as either minimax optimal or instance optimal: the former hold for the set of distribution pairs with prescribed Hellinger divergence and total variation distance, whereas the latter hold for specific distribution pairs. For the sample complexity of simple hypothesis testing under pure LDP constraints, we establish instance-optimal bounds for distributions with binary support; minimax-optimal bounds for general distributions; and (approximately) instance-optimal, computationally efficient algorithms for general distributions. When both privacy and communication constraints are present, we develop instance-optimal, computationally efficient algorithms that achieve the minimum possible sample complexity (up to universal constants). Our results on instance-optimal algorithms hinge on identifying the extreme points of the joint range set $\mathcal A$ of two distributions $p$ and $q$, defined as $\mathcal A := \{(\mathbf T p, \mathbf T q) | \mathbf T \in \mathcal C\}$, where $\mathcal C$ is the set of channels characterizing the constraints.Comment: 1 figur

On Power Allocation for Distributed Detection with Correlated Observations and Linear Fusion

We consider a binary hypothesis testing problem in an inhomogeneous wireless sensor network, where a fusion center (FC) makes a global decision on the underlying hypothesis. We assume sensors observations are correlated Gaussian and sensors are unaware of this correlation when making decisions. Sensors send their modulated decisions over fading channels, subject to individual and/or total transmit power constraints. For parallel-access channel (PAC) and multiple-access channel (MAC) models, we derive modified deflection coefficient (MDC) of the test statistic at the FC with coherent reception.We propose a transmit power allocation scheme, which maximizes MDC of the test statistic, under three different sets of transmit power constraints: total power constraint, individual and total power constraints, individual power constraints only. When analytical solutions to our constrained optimization problems are elusive, we discuss how these problems can be converted to convex ones. We study how correlation among sensors observations, reliability of local decisions, communication channel model and channel qualities and transmit power constraints affect the reliability of the global decision and power allocation of inhomogeneous sensors

Model-Driven End-to-End Learning for Integrated Sensing and Communication

Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) is envisioned to be one of the pillars of 6G. However, 6G is also expected to be severely affected by hardware impairments. Under such impairments, standard model-based approaches might fail if they do not capture the underlying reality. To this end, data-driven methods are an alternative to deal with cases where imperfections cannot be easily modeled. In this paper, we propose a model-driven learning architecture for joint single- target multi-input multi-output (MIMO) sensing and multi-input single-output (MISO) communication. We compare it with a standard neural network approach under complexity constraints. Results show that under hardware impairments, both learning methods yield better results than the model-based standard baseline. If complexity constraints are further introduced, model- driven learning outperforms the neural-network-based approach. Model-driven learning also shows better generalization performance for new unseen testing scenario

Bayesian Design of Tandem Networks for Distributed Detection With Multi-bit Sensor Decisions

We consider the problem of decentralized hypothesis testing under communication constraints in a topology where several peripheral nodes are arranged in tandem. Each node receives an observation and transmits a message to its successor, and the last node then decides which hypothesis is true. We assume that the observations at different nodes are, conditioned on the true hypothesis, independent and the channel between any two successive nodes is considered error-free but rate-constrained. We propose a cyclic numerical design algorithm for the design of nodes using a person-by-person methodology with the minimum expected error probability as a design criterion, where the number of communicated messages is not necessarily equal to the number of hypotheses. The number of peripheral nodes in the proposed method is in principle arbitrary and the information rate constraints are satisfied by quantizing the input of each node. The performance of the proposed method for different information rate constraints, in a binary hypothesis test, is compared to the optimum rate-one solution due to Swaszek and a method proposed by Cover, and it is shown numerically that increasing the channel rate can significantly enhance the performance of the tandem network. Simulation results for $M$-ary hypothesis tests also show that by increasing the channel rates the performance of the tandem network significantly improves

Communication Complexity of Distributed Statistical Algorithms

This paper constructs bounds on the minimax risk under loss functions when statistical estimation is performed in a distributed environment and with communication constraints. We treat this problem using techniques from information theory and communication complexity. In many cases our bounds rely crucially on metric entropy conditions and the classical reduction from estimation to testing. A number of examples exhibit how bounds on the minimax risk play out in practice. We also study distributed statistical estimation problems in the context of PAC-learnability and derive explicit algorithms for solving classical problems. We study the communication complexity of these algorithms

Testing Against Independence with an Eavesdropper

We study a distributed binary hypothesis testing (HT) problem with communication and security constraints, involving three parties: a remote sensor called Alice, a legitimate decision centre called Bob, and an eavesdropper called Eve, all having their own source observations. In this system, Alice conveys a rate R description of her observation to Bob, and Bob performs a binary hypothesis test on the joint distribution underlying his and Alice's observations. The goal of Alice and Bob is to maximise the exponential decay of Bob's miss-detection (type II-error) probability under two constraints: Bob's false alarm-probability (type-I error) probability has to stay below a given threshold and Eve's uncertainty (equivocation) about Alice's observations should stay above a given security threshold even when Eve learns Alice's message. For the special case of testing against independence, we characterise the largest possible type-II error exponent under the described type-I error probability and security constraints.Comment: submitted to ITW 202