Real-time Traffic Classification for 5G NSA Encrypted Data Flows With Physical Channel Records

The classification of fifth-generation New-Radio (5G-NR) mobile network traffic is an emerging topic in the field of telecommunications. It can be utilized for quality of service (QoS) management and dynamic resource allocation. However, traditional approaches such as Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) can not be directly applied to encrypted data flows. Therefore, new real-time encrypted traffic classification algorithms need to be investigated to handle dynamic transmission. In this study, we examine the real-time encrypted 5G Non-Standalone (NSA) application-level traffic classification using physical channel records. Due to the vastness of their features, decision-tree-based gradient boosting algorithms are a viable approach for classification. We generate a noise-limited 5G NSA trace dataset with traffic from multiple applications. We develop a new pipeline to convert sequences of physical channel records into numerical vectors. A set of machine learning models are tested, and we propose our solution based on Light Gradient Boosting Machine (LGBM) due to its advantages in fast parallel training and low computational burden in practical scenarios. Our experiments demonstrate that our algorithm can achieve 95% accuracy on the classification task with a state-of-the-art response time as quick as 10ms.

An Interpretable Federated Learning-based Network Intrusion Detection Framework

Learning-based Network Intrusion Detection Systems (NIDSs) are widely deployed for defending various cyberattacks. Existing learning-based NIDS mainly uses Neural Network (NN) as a classifier that relies on the quality and quantity of cyberattack data. Such NN-based approaches are also hard to interpret for improving efficiency and scalability. In this paper, we design a new local-global computation paradigm, FEDFOREST, a novel learning-based NIDS by combining the interpretable Gradient Boosting Decision Tree (GBDT) and Federated Learning (FL) framework. Specifically, FEDFOREST is composed of multiple clients that extract local cyberattack data features for the server to train models and detect intrusions. A privacy-enhanced technology is also proposed in FEDFOREST to further defeat the privacy of the FL systems. Extensive experiments on 4 cyberattack datasets of different tasks demonstrate that FEDFOREST is effective, efficient, interpretable, and extendable. FEDFOREST ranks first in the collaborative learning and cybersecurity competition 2021 for Chinese college students.

Fingerprinting Multi-exit Deep Neural Network Models via Inference Time

Transforming large deep neural network (DNN) models into the multi-exit architectures can overcome the overthinking issue and distribute a large DNN model on resource-constrained scenarios (e.g. IoT frontend devices and backend servers) for inference and transmission efficiency. Nevertheless, intellectual property (IP) protection for the multi-exit models in the wild is still an unsolved challenge. Previous efforts to verify DNN model ownership mainly rely on querying the model with specific samples and checking the responses, e.g., DNN watermarking and fingerprinting. However, they are vulnerable to adversarial settings such as adversarial training and are not suitable for the IP verification for multi-exit DNN models. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to fingerprint multi-exit models via inference time rather than inference predictions. Specifically, we design an effective method to generate a set of fingerprint samples to craft the inference process with a unique and robust inference time cost as the evidence for model ownership. We conduct extensive experiments to prove the uniqueness and robustness of our method on three structures (ResNet-56, VGG-16, and MobileNet) and three datasets (CIFAR-10, CIFAR-100, and Tiny-ImageNet) under comprehensive adversarial settings.

TDGIA:Effective Injection Attacks on Graph Neural Networks

Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) have achieved promising performance in various real-world applications. However, recent studies have shown that GNNs are vulnerable to adversarial attacks. In this paper, we study a recently-introduced realistic attack scenario on graphs -- graph injection attack (GIA). In the GIA scenario, the adversary is not able to modify the existing link structure and node attributes of the input graph, instead the attack is performed by injecting adversarial nodes into it. We present an analysis on the topological vulnerability of GNNs under GIA setting, based on which we propose the Topological Defective Graph Injection Attack (TDGIA) for effective injection attacks. TDGIA first introduces the topological defective edge selection strategy to choose the original nodes for connecting with the injected ones. It then designs the smooth feature optimization objective to generate the features for the injected nodes. Extensive experiments on large-scale datasets show that TDGIA can consistently and significantly outperform various attack baselines in attacking dozens of defense GNN models. Notably, the performance drop on target GNNs resultant from TDGIA is more than double the damage brought by the best attack solution among hundreds of submissions on KDD-CUP 2020.

Hidden Backdoors in Human-Centric Language Models

Natural language processing (NLP) systems have been proven to be vulnerable to backdoor attacks, whereby hidden features (backdoors) are trained into a language model and may only be activated by specific inputs (called triggers), to trick the model into producing unexpected behaviors. In this paper, we create covert and natural triggers for textual backdoor attacks, \textit{hidden backdoors}, where triggers can fool both modern language models and human inspection. We deploy our hidden backdoors through two state-of-the-art trigger embedding methods. The first approach via homograph replacement, embeds the trigger into deep neural networks through the visual spoofing of lookalike character replacement. The second approach uses subtle differences between text generated by language models and real natural text to produce trigger sentences with correct grammar and high fluency. We demonstrate that the proposed hidden backdoors can be effective across three downstream security-critical NLP tasks, representative of modern human-centric NLP systems, including toxic comment detection, neural machine translation (NMT), and question answering (QA). Our two hidden backdoor attacks can achieve an Attack Success Rate (ASR) of at least $97\%$ with an injection rate of only $3\%$ in toxic comment detection, $95.1\%$ ASR in NMT with less than $0.5\%$ injected data, and finally $91.12\%$ ASR against QA updated with only 27 poisoning data samples on a model previously trained with 92,024 samples (0.029\%). We are able to demonstrate the adversary's high success rate of attacks, while maintaining functionality for regular users, with triggers inconspicuous by the human administrators.