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PIR-DSN: A Decentralized Storage Network Supporting Private Information Retrieval

Jiahao Zhang, Minghui Xu, Hechuan Guo, Xiuzhen Cheng

TL;DR

PIR-DSN tackles the challenge of user privacy in decentralized storage networks by introducing a secure FID-to-index mapping based on an asynchronous cryptographic accumulator and by integrating single-server and multi-server private information retrieval protocols. The SPIR-DSN and MPIR-DSN designs offer private retrieval from a single miner or multiple replicated miners, respectively, while public verifiability and robustness against Byzantine faults are achieved through ACA proofs and BR-PIR with HotStuff-based state machine replication. The authors implement and evaluate PIR-DSN against major DSNs, showing comparable upload and deletion performance to existing systems and acceptable retrieval latency given the privacy guarantees. The work demonstrates the practical viability of private retrieval in DSNs and lays groundwork for privacy-preserving Web3 storage infrastructures. Future work will focus on further reducing privacy-related overhead and enhancing scalability in larger, more diverse DSN deployments.

Abstract

Decentralized Storage Networks (DSNs) are emerging as a foundational infrastructure for Web 3.0, offering global peer-to-peer storage. However, a critical vulnerability persists: user privacy during file retrieval remains largely unaddressed, risking the exposure of sensitive information. To overcome this, we introduce PIR-DSN, the first DSN protocol to integrate Private Information Retrieval (PIR) for both single and multi-server settings. Our key innovations include a novel secure mapping method that transforms sparse file identifiers into compact integer indexes, enabling both public verifiability of file operations and efficient private retrieval. Furthermore, PIR-DSN guarantees Byzantine-robust private retrieval through file replication across multiple miners. We implement and rigorously evaluate PIR-DSN against three prominent industrial DSN systems. Experimental results demonstrate that PIR-DSN achieves comparable overhead for file upload and deletion. While PIR inherently introduces an additional computational cost leading to higher retrieval latency, PIR-DSN maintains comparable throughput. These findings underscore PIR-DSN's practical viability for privacy-sensitive applications within DSN environments.

PIR-DSN: A Decentralized Storage Network Supporting Private Information Retrieval

TL;DR

PIR-DSN tackles the challenge of user privacy in decentralized storage networks by introducing a secure FID-to-index mapping based on an asynchronous cryptographic accumulator and by integrating single-server and multi-server private information retrieval protocols. The SPIR-DSN and MPIR-DSN designs offer private retrieval from a single miner or multiple replicated miners, respectively, while public verifiability and robustness against Byzantine faults are achieved through ACA proofs and BR-PIR with HotStuff-based state machine replication. The authors implement and evaluate PIR-DSN against major DSNs, showing comparable upload and deletion performance to existing systems and acceptable retrieval latency given the privacy guarantees. The work demonstrates the practical viability of private retrieval in DSNs and lays groundwork for privacy-preserving Web3 storage infrastructures. Future work will focus on further reducing privacy-related overhead and enhancing scalability in larger, more diverse DSN deployments.

Abstract

Decentralized Storage Networks (DSNs) are emerging as a foundational infrastructure for Web 3.0, offering global peer-to-peer storage. However, a critical vulnerability persists: user privacy during file retrieval remains largely unaddressed, risking the exposure of sensitive information. To overcome this, we introduce PIR-DSN, the first DSN protocol to integrate Private Information Retrieval (PIR) for both single and multi-server settings. Our key innovations include a novel secure mapping method that transforms sparse file identifiers into compact integer indexes, enabling both public verifiability of file operations and efficient private retrieval. Furthermore, PIR-DSN guarantees Byzantine-robust private retrieval through file replication across multiple miners. We implement and rigorously evaluate PIR-DSN against three prominent industrial DSN systems. Experimental results demonstrate that PIR-DSN achieves comparable overhead for file upload and deletion. While PIR inherently introduces an additional computational cost leading to higher retrieval latency, PIR-DSN maintains comparable throughput. These findings underscore PIR-DSN's practical viability for privacy-sensitive applications within DSN environments.

Paper Structure

This paper contains 42 sections, 2 theorems, 3 equations, 5 figures, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. The sparsity of FIDs hinders efficient private information retrieval
  3. Malicious storage miners can undermine data availability
  4. Related Works
  5. Privacy Protection Schemes in DSNs
  6. Distributed Systems Employing PIR
  7. Limitations of Existing Methods
  8. Model, Preliminary and Design Goals
  9. Network Model
  10. Participants
  11. Adversary
  12. Preliminary
  13. Private Information Retrieval (PIR)
  14. Asynchronous Cryptographic Accumulator (ACA)
  15. Design Goals
  16. ...and 27 more sections

Key Result

Theorem 1

Assuming a storage miner stores $n$ files, PIR-DSN achieves advantages in terms of both security and efficiency. (1) Security: PIR-DSN satisfies public verifiability, privacy, and robustness as defined in our design goals. (2) efficiency: it can verify a file upload and deletion both in $O(\log n)$

Figures (5)

  • Figure 1: The diagram of the SPIR-DSN protocol
  • Figure 2: Latency of four basic operations
  • Figure 3: The throughput and latency of file upload operation
  • Figure 4: The throughput and latency of file deletion operation
  • Figure 5: The throughput and latency of file retrieval operation

Theorems & Definitions (3)

  • Theorem 1
  • proof
  • Lemma 1