Welcome to the resource topic for 2025/2037
Title:
On the Simulation-Extractability of Proof-Carrying Data
Authors: Behzad Abdolmaleki, Matteo Campanelli, Quang Dao, Hamidreza Khoshakhlagh
Abstract:With proof-carrying data (PCD), nodes in a distributed computation can certify its correct execution obtaining proofs with low-verification overhead (relative to the complexity of the computation). As PCD systems—and their special case, incrementally verifiable computation (IVC)—see rapid adoption in practice, understanding their robustness against malleability attacks becomes crucial. In particular, it remains unexplored whether recursive proof systems satisfy simulation extractability (SIM-EXT)—a property ensuring non-malleability and composability.
This work provides the first systematic study of simulation extractability for PCD. We begin by observing that the standard SIM-EXT notion for non-recursive zkSNARKs does not directly extend to PCD/IVC settings. To address this, we propose a new, tailored definition of SIM-EXT for proof-carrying data that accounts for their idiosyncratic features. Using this framework, we prove two general results: (1) that a simulation-extractable SNARK implies a simulation-extractable PCD when used recursively, and (2) that even lighter PCD constructions—built from a (not necessarily succinct) argument of knowledge (NARK) combined with a split-accumulation scheme—achieve SIM-EXT of PCD by requiring SIM-EXT only from the underlying NARK. Our results show that many modern PCD systems are already simulation-extractable by design.
ePrint: https://eprint.iacr.org/2025/2037
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