Machine Learning and Computer Security

While traditional computer security relies on well-defined attack models and proofs of security, a science of security for machine learning systems has proven more elusive. This is due to a number of obstacles, including (1) the highly varied angles of attack against ML systems, (2) the lack of a clearly defined attack surface (because the source of the data analyzed by ML systems is not easily traced), and (3) the lack of clear formal definitions of security that are appropriate for ML systems. At the same time, security of ML systems is of great import due the recent trend of using ML systems as a line of defense against malicious behavior (e.g., network intrusion, malware, and ransomware), as well as the prevalence of ML systems as parts of sensitive and valuable software systems (e.g., sentiment analyzers for predicting stock prices). This workshop will bring together experts from the computer security and machine learning communities in an attempt to highlight recent work in this area, as well as to clarify the foundations of secure ML and chart out important directions for future work and cross-community collaborations.