Secure Federated XGBoost with CUDA-accelerated Homomorphic Encryption via NVIDIA FLARE

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Xu, Ziyue, Hsieh, Yuan-Ting, Zhang, Zhihong, Roth, Holger R., Chen, Chester, Cheng, Yan, Feng, Andrew
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Xu, Ziyue
Hsieh, Yuan-Ting
Zhang, Zhihong
Roth, Holger R.
Chen, Chester
Cheng, Yan
Feng, Andrew
author_facet Xu, Ziyue
Hsieh, Yuan-Ting
Zhang, Zhihong
Roth, Holger R.
Chen, Chester
Cheng, Yan
Feng, Andrew
contents Federated learning (FL) enables collaborative model training across decentralized datasets. NVIDIA FLARE's Federated XGBoost extends the popular XGBoost algorithm to both vertical and horizontal federated settings, facilitating joint model development without direct data sharing. However, the initial implementation assumed mutual trust over the sharing of intermediate gradient statistics produced by the XGBoost algorithm, leaving potential vulnerabilities to honest-but-curious adversaries. This work introduces "Secure Federated XGBoost", an efficient solution to mitigate these risks. We implement secure federated algorithms for both vertical and horizontal scenarios, addressing diverse data security patterns. To secure the messages, we leverage homomorphic encryption (HE) to protect sensitive information during training. A novel plugin and processor interface seamlessly integrates HE into the Federated XGBoost pipeline, enabling secure aggregation over ciphertexts. We present both CPU-based and CUDA-accelerated HE plugins, demonstrating significant performance gains. Notably, our CUDA-accelerated HE implementation achieves up to 30x speedups in vertical Federated XGBoost compared to existing third-party solutions. By securing critical computation steps and encrypting sensitive assets, Secure Federated XGBoost provides robust data privacy guarantees, reinforcing the fundamental benefits of federated learning while maintaining high performance.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_03909
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Secure Federated XGBoost with CUDA-accelerated Homomorphic Encryption via NVIDIA FLARE
Xu, Ziyue
Hsieh, Yuan-Ting
Zhang, Zhihong
Roth, Holger R.
Chen, Chester
Cheng, Yan
Feng, Andrew
Cryptography and Security
Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
Emerging Technologies
Federated learning (FL) enables collaborative model training across decentralized datasets. NVIDIA FLARE's Federated XGBoost extends the popular XGBoost algorithm to both vertical and horizontal federated settings, facilitating joint model development without direct data sharing. However, the initial implementation assumed mutual trust over the sharing of intermediate gradient statistics produced by the XGBoost algorithm, leaving potential vulnerabilities to honest-but-curious adversaries. This work introduces "Secure Federated XGBoost", an efficient solution to mitigate these risks. We implement secure federated algorithms for both vertical and horizontal scenarios, addressing diverse data security patterns. To secure the messages, we leverage homomorphic encryption (HE) to protect sensitive information during training. A novel plugin and processor interface seamlessly integrates HE into the Federated XGBoost pipeline, enabling secure aggregation over ciphertexts. We present both CPU-based and CUDA-accelerated HE plugins, demonstrating significant performance gains. Notably, our CUDA-accelerated HE implementation achieves up to 30x speedups in vertical Federated XGBoost compared to existing third-party solutions. By securing critical computation steps and encrypting sensitive assets, Secure Federated XGBoost provides robust data privacy guarantees, reinforcing the fundamental benefits of federated learning while maintaining high performance.
title Secure Federated XGBoost with CUDA-accelerated Homomorphic Encryption via NVIDIA FLARE
topic Cryptography and Security
Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
Emerging Technologies
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.03909