skip to main content
research-article
Open access

Robustness meets algorithms

Published: 26 April 2021 Publication History

Abstract

In every corner of machine learning and statistics, there is a need for estimators that work not just in an idealized model, but even when their assumptions are violated. Unfortunately, in high dimensions, being provably robust and being efficiently computable are often at odds with each other.
We give the first efficient algorithm for estimating the parameters of a high-dimensional Gaussian that is able to tolerate a constant fraction of corruptions that is independent of the dimension. Prior to our work, all known estimators either needed time exponential in the dimension to compute or could tolerate only an inverse-polynomial fraction of corruptions. Not only does our algorithm bridge the gap between robustness and algorithms, but also it turns out to be highly practical in a variety of settings.

References

[1]
Awasthi, P., Balcan, M.F., Long, P.M. The power of localization for efficiently learning linear separators with noise. In Proceedings of the 46th Annual ACM Symposium on the Theory of Computing, STOC '14 (New York, NY, USA, 2014), ACM, 449--458.
[2]
Balakrishnan, S., Du, S.S., Li, J., Singh, A. Computationally efficient robust sparse estimation in high dimensions. In Proceedings of the 30th Annual Conference on Learning Theory, COLT '17 (2017), 169--212.
[3]
Charikar, M., Steinhardt, J., Valiant, G. Learning from untrusted data. In Proceedings of the 49th Annual ACM Symposium on the Theory of Computing, STOC '17 (New York, NY, USA, 2017), ACM, 47--60.
[4]
Diakonikolas, I., Kamath, G., Kane, D.M., Li, J., Moitra, A., Stewart, A. Robust estimators in high dimensions without the computational intractability. In Proceedings of the 57th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science, FOCS '16 (Washington, DC, USA, 2016), IEEE Computer Society, 655--664.
[5]
Diakonikolas, I., Kamath, G., Kane, D.M., Li, J., Moitra, A., Stewart, A. Being robust (in high dimensions) can be practical. In Proceedings of the 34th International Conference on Machine Learning, ICML '17 (2017), JMLR, Inc., 999--1008.
[6]
Diakonikolas, I., Kamath, G., Kane, D.M., Li, J., Moitra, A., Stewartz, A. Robustly learning a Gaussian: Getting optimal error, efficiently. In Proceedings of the 29th Annual ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms, SODA '18 (Philadelphia, PA, USA, 2018), SIAM.
[7]
Diakonikolas, I., Kamath, G., Kane, D.M., Li, J., Steinhardt, J., Stewart, A. Sever: A robust meta-algorithm for stochastic optimization. In Proceedings of the 36th International Conference on Machine Learning, ICML '19 (2019), JMLR, Inc., 1596--1606.
[8]
Diakonikolas, I., Kane, D.M. Recent advances in algorithmic high-dimensional robust statistics. CoRR, abs/1911.05911, 2019.
[9]
Diakonikolas, I., Kane, D.M., Stewart, A. Statistical query lower bounds for robust estimation of high-dimensional Gaussians and Gaussian mixtures. In Proceedings of the 58th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science, FOCS '17 (Washington, DC, USA, 2017), IEEE Computer Society, 73--84.
[10]
Diakonikolas, I., Kane, D.M., Stewart, A. List-decodable robust mean estimation and learning mixtures of spherical Gaussians. In Proceedings of the 50th Annual ACM Symposium on the Theory of Computing, STOC '18 (New York, NY, USA, 2018), ACM, 1047--1060.
[11]
Fischler, M.A., Bolles, R.C. Random sample consensus: A paradigm for model fitting with applications to image analysis and automated cartography. Commun. ACM 6, 24 (1981), 381--395.
[12]
Fisher, R.A. On the mathematical foundations of theoretical statistics. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. Ser. A 594--604, 222 (1922), 309--368.
[13]
Hampel, F.R., Ronchetti, E.M., Rousseeuw, P.J., Stahel, W.A. Robust Statistics: The Approach Based on Influence Functions. Wiley, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2011.
[14]
Hopkins, S.B., Li, J. Mixture models, robustness, and sum of squares proofs. In Proceedings of the 50th Annual ACM Symposium on the Theory of Computing, STOC '18 (New York, NY, USA, 2018), ACM, Hoboken, New Jersey, 1021--1034.
[15]
Huber, P.J., Ronchetti, E.M. Robust Statistics. Wiley, 2009.
[16]
Johnson, D.S., Preparata, F.P. The densest hemisphere problem. Theor. Comp. Sci. 1, 6 (1978), 93--107.
[17]
Kearns, M.J., Schapire, R.E., Sellie, L.M. Towards efficient agnostic learning. Mach. Learn. 2--3, 17 (1994), 115--141.
[18]
Klivans, A.R., Long, P.M., Servedio, R.A. Learning halfspaces with malicious noise. J. Mach. Learn. Res., 10 (2009), 2715--2740.
[19]
Kothari, P., Steinhardt, J., Steurer, D. Robust moment estimation and improved clustering via sum of squares. In Proceedings of the 50th Annual ACM Symposium on the Theory of Computing, STOC '18 (New York, NY, USA, 2018), ACM, 1035--1046.
[20]
Lai, K.A., Rao, A.B., Vempala, S. Agnostic estimation of mean and covariance. In Proceedings of the 57th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science, FOCS '16 (Washington, DC, USA, 2016), IEEE Computer Society, 665--674.
[21]
Novembre, J., Johnson, T., Bryc, K., Kutalik, Z., Boyko, A.R., Auton, A., Indap, A., King, K.S., Bergmann, S., Nelson, M.R., Stephens, M., Bustamante, C.D. Genes mirror geography within Europe. Nature 7218, 456 (2008), 98--101.
[22]
Prasad, A., Suggala, A.S., Balakrishnan, S., Ravikumar, P. Robust estimation via robust gradient estimation. arXiv preprint arXiv:1802.06485 (2018).
[23]
Rousseeuw, P. Multivariate estimation with high breakdown point. Math. Statist. Appl., 8 (1985), 283--297.
[24]
Tukey, J.W. A survey of sampling from contaminated distributions. In Contributions to Probability and Statistics: Essays in Honor of Harold Hotelling, Stanford University Press, Stanford, California, 1960, 448--485.
[25]
Tukey, J.W. Mathematics and the picturing of data. In Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians (1975), American Mathematical Society, 523--531.

Cited By

View all

Index Terms

  1. Robustness meets algorithms

    Recommendations

    Comments

    Information & Contributors

    Information

    Published In

    cover image Communications of the ACM
    Communications of the ACM  Volume 64, Issue 5
    May 2021
    112 pages
    ISSN:0001-0782
    EISSN:1557-7317
    DOI:10.1145/3462701
    Issue’s Table of Contents
    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution International 4.0 License.

    Publisher

    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 26 April 2021
    Published in CACM Volume 64, Issue 5

    Permissions

    Request permissions for this article.

    Check for updates

    Qualifiers

    • Research-article
    • Research
    • Refereed

    Funding Sources

    Contributors

    Other Metrics

    Bibliometrics & Citations

    Bibliometrics

    Article Metrics

    • Downloads (Last 12 months)2,085
    • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)163
    Reflects downloads up to 28 Dec 2024

    Other Metrics

    Citations

    Cited By

    View all

    View Options

    View options

    PDF

    View or Download as a PDF file.

    PDF

    eReader

    View online with eReader.

    eReader

    Digital Edition

    View this article in digital edition.

    Digital Edition

    Magazine Site

    View this article on the magazine site (external)

    Magazine Site

    Login options

    Full Access

    Media

    Figures

    Other

    Tables

    Share

    Share

    Share this Publication link

    Share on social media