The δ-Gene: Inference-Time Physical Unclonable Functions from Architecture-Invariant Output Geometry

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Autore principale: Coslett, Anthony
Natura: Recurso digital
Lingua:inglese
Pubblicazione: Zenodo 2026
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author Coslett, Anthony
author_facet Coslett, Anthony
contents <p>As neural language models are deployed in regulated domains, verifiable model provenance becomes a critical security requirement. We construct an Inference-Time Physical Unclonable Function (IT-PUF) that provides a challenge-response authentication protocol for neural networks, achieving zero false acceptances across 1,012 comparisons spanning 23 models and 16 vendor families.</p> <p>The IT-PUF derives its entropy from a geometrically intrinsic behavioral fingerprint—the delta-gene (the third pre-softmax logit gap)—which we prove is invariant to inference temperature and empirically validate as invariant across six distinct neural architectures. We provide a formal impossibility result for fingerprint spoofing: an interval-splitting theorem proves that no adversarial Kullback-Leibler (KL) budget can simultaneously close the fingerprint gap and avoid detection via accumulated noise.</p> <p>To establish that this security does not degrade at scale, we validate an Equation of State across three independent model families spanning a 147x parameter range (0.5B to 72B). We falsify the assumption of unbounded stiffness but discover a strict positive empirical floor (S_min = 1.1797), from which the Cramér-Rao bound guarantees a computable minimum spoofing cost. The theoretical foundation is formally verified in the Coq proof assistant: 311 theorems across 16 files, with zero uses of "Admitted" and zero vacuous definitions.</p>
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language eng
publishDate 2026
publisher Zenodo
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spellingShingle The δ-Gene: Inference-Time Physical Unclonable Functions from Architecture-Invariant Output Geometry
Coslett, Anthony
physical unclonable functions
model authentication
neural network fingerprinting
challenge-response protocol
impossibility theorem
formal verification
Coq proof assistant
Fisher information
Cramér-Rao bound
extreme value theory
logit gap
output geometry
adversarial robustness
model provenance
AI security
inference-time verification
Computer security
Cryptography
Machine learning
EU AI Act
IT-PUF
logprob fingerprinting
AI intellectual property verification
<p>As neural language models are deployed in regulated domains, verifiable model provenance becomes a critical security requirement. We construct an Inference-Time Physical Unclonable Function (IT-PUF) that provides a challenge-response authentication protocol for neural networks, achieving zero false acceptances across 1,012 comparisons spanning 23 models and 16 vendor families.</p> <p>The IT-PUF derives its entropy from a geometrically intrinsic behavioral fingerprint—the delta-gene (the third pre-softmax logit gap)—which we prove is invariant to inference temperature and empirically validate as invariant across six distinct neural architectures. We provide a formal impossibility result for fingerprint spoofing: an interval-splitting theorem proves that no adversarial Kullback-Leibler (KL) budget can simultaneously close the fingerprint gap and avoid detection via accumulated noise.</p> <p>To establish that this security does not degrade at scale, we validate an Equation of State across three independent model families spanning a 147x parameter range (0.5B to 72B). We falsify the assumption of unbounded stiffness but discover a strict positive empirical floor (S_min = 1.1797), from which the Cramér-Rao bound guarantees a computable minimum spoofing cost. The theoretical foundation is formally verified in the Coq proof assistant: 311 theorems across 16 files, with zero uses of "Admitted" and zero vacuous definitions.</p>
title The δ-Gene: Inference-Time Physical Unclonable Functions from Architecture-Invariant Output Geometry
topic physical unclonable functions
model authentication
neural network fingerprinting
challenge-response protocol
impossibility theorem
formal verification
Coq proof assistant
Fisher information
Cramér-Rao bound
extreme value theory
logit gap
output geometry
adversarial robustness
model provenance
AI security
inference-time verification
Computer security
Cryptography
Machine learning
EU AI Act
IT-PUF
logprob fingerprinting
AI intellectual property verification
url https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18818788