Locally Private k-Means in One Round
Alisa Chang, Badih Ghazi, Ravi Kumar, Pasin Manurangsi
Abstract
We provide an approximation algorithm for k-means clustering in the \emph{one-round} (aka \emph{non-interactive}) local model of differential privacy (DP). Our algorithm achieves an approximation ratio arbitrarily close to the best \emph{non private} approximation algorithm, improving upon previously known algorithms that only guarantee large (constant) approximation ratios. Furthermore, ours is the first constant-factor approximation algorithm for k-means that requires only \emph{one} round of communication in the local DP model, positively resolving an open question of Stemmer (SODA 2020). Our algorithmic framework is quite flexible; we demonstrate this by showing that it also yields a similar near-optimal approximation algorithm in the (one-round) shuffle DP model.
BibTeX
@InProceedings{pmlr-v139-chang21a,
title = {Locally Private k-Means in One Round},
author = {Chang, Alisa and Ghazi, Badih and Kumar, Ravi and Manurangsi, Pasin},
booktitle = {Proceedings of the 38th International Conference on Machine Learning},
pages = {1441--1451},
year = {2021},
editor = {Meila, Marina and Zhang, Tong},
volume = {139},
series = {Proceedings of Machine Learning Research},
month = {18--24 Jul},
publisher = {PMLR},
pdf = {http://proceedings.mlr.press/v139/chang21a/chang21a.pdf},
url = {https://proceedings.mlr.press/v139/chang21a.html},
abstract = {We provide an approximation algorithm for k-means clustering in the \emph{one-round} (aka \emph{non-interactive}) local model of differential privacy (DP). Our algorithm achieves an approximation ratio arbitrarily close to the best \emph{non private} approximation algorithm, improving upon previously known algorithms that only guarantee large (constant) approximation ratios. Furthermore, ours is the first constant-factor approximation algorithm for k-means that requires only \emph{one} round of communication in the local DP model, positively resolving an open question of Stemmer (SODA 2020). Our algorithmic framework is quite flexible; we demonstrate this by showing that it also yields a similar near-optimal approximation algorithm in the (one-round) shuffle DP model.}
}