Skip to content
Tracks @XLab

Subtlety: visible vs reliable

The red team's second decision factor. Subtler backdoors are harder for the monitor to flag but more likely to be broken, so the win probability has an interior optimum in subtlety.

Subtlety: visible vs reliable

The red team's second decision factor. Subtler backdoors are harder for the monitor to flag but more likely to be broken, so the win probability has an interior optimum in subtlety.

Per-attack outcome probability, and P(red wins)

050%100%successfully deployeddeployed but brokencaughtoptimumP(red wins)38%0blatantsubtle

Per attack, at this subtlety's best attack rate:

Caught by monitor c

51.9%

Backdoor reliability p_{\text{works}}

57.9%

Successfully deployed s

27.9%

s/(s+c)34.9%×1-(1-s-c)^k99.7%=P(\text{red wins})34.8%

Embed this demo

Use the chrome-less embed view inside an iframe:

<iframe src="/demos/subtlety/embed" width="100%" height="360" style="border:0"></iframe>