Proofs for Deep Thought: Accumulation for Large Memories and Deterministic Computations

Benedikt Bünz, Jessica Chen

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

Abstract

An important part in proving machine computation is to prove the correctness of the read and write operations performed from the memory, which we term memory-proving. Previous methodologies required proving Merkle Tree openings or multi-set hashes, resulting in relatively large proof circuits. We construct an efficient memory-proving Incrementally Verifiable Computation (IVC) scheme from accumulation, which is particularly useful for machine computations with large memories and deterministic steps. In our scheme, the IVC prover PIVC has cost entirely independent of the memory size T and only needs to commit to approximately 15 field elements per read/write operation, marking a more than 100X improvement over prior work. We further reduce this cost by employing a modified, accumulation-friendly version of the GKR protocol. In the optimized version, PIVC only needs to commit to 6 small memory-table elements per read/write. If the table stores 32-bit values, then this is equivalent to committing to less than one single field element per read and write. Our modified GKR protocol is also valuable for proving other deterministic computations within the context of IVC. Our memory-proving protocol can be extended to support key-value stores.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationAdvances in Cryptology – ASIACRYPT 2024 - 30th International Conference on the Theory and Application of Cryptology and Information Security, Proceedings
EditorsKai-Min Chung, Yu Sasaki
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH
Pages269-301
Number of pages33
ISBN (Print)9789819609345
DOIs
StatePublished - 2025
Event30th Annual International Conference on the Theory and Application of Cryptology and Information Security, ASIACRYPT 2024 - Kolkata, India
Duration: Dec 9 2024Dec 13 2024

Publication series

NameLecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
Volume15488 LNCS
ISSN (Print)0302-9743
ISSN (Electronic)1611-3349

Conference

Conference30th Annual International Conference on the Theory and Application of Cryptology and Information Security, ASIACRYPT 2024
Country/TerritoryIndia
CityKolkata
Period12/9/2412/13/24

Keywords

  • Accumulation Scheme
  • Incrementally Verifiable Computation
  • Proof system

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Theoretical Computer Science
  • General Computer Science

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