arXiv subjects

Tomáš Masopust

Publications and source records attributed to Tomáš Masopust.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Supervisory Control under Partial Observation: Where Observation Consistency Becomes Decidable

Observation consistency (OC) and modified observation consistency (MOC) are structural conditions used in hierarchical and modular supervisory control under partial observation. Their verification for languages generated by deterministic finite automata is PSPACE-hard, whereas decidability was open. We answer this question by showing that both problems are undecidable, that is, there are no algorithms verifying OC or MOC. On the positive side, we identify a decidable class defined by a restriction on the plant: if every cycle of the automaton contains a transition labeled by an observable high-level event, then verification of both conditions is PSPACE-complete.

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arXiv2026

Deciding Relabeling Observation Consistency in Multi-Agent Discrete-Event Systems

Scalable supervisors for multi-agent discrete-event systems control groups of isomorphic agents through a common template. Under partial observation, such a supervisor is maximally permissive if the relabeling that maps the agents onto their template is relabeling observation consistent (ROC) and a local companion condition holds. Whether ROC is decidable was open. We show that it is PSPACE-complete: for nondeterministic plants with two observable and one unobservable event, and for deterministic plants with two observable and two unobservable events. On the tractable side, we characterize the relabelings that guarantee ROC for every plant, we give a polynomial-time algorithm for deterministic plants whose relabeling is injective on unobservable events, and we give sufficient conditions based on saturation and on simulation, with polynomial-time tests for both. We further show that ROC is compositional for components with pairwise disjoint templates, with equivalence if the alphabets are moreover pairwise disjoint, and that neither hypothesis can be dropped. Finally, we show that the structural condition proposed in the literature to guarantee ROC is incorrect, and repair the companion inclusion that the same proposition asserts.

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arXiv2026

Complexity of Local Observation Consistency in Discrete-Event Systems

Hierarchical and multi-agent supervisory control under partial observation relies on local consistency conditions between a plant and its abstraction: local observation consistency (LOC) for the projection abstractions of hierarchical control, and local relabeling observation consistency (LROC) for the relabeling abstractions of multi-agent systems. Both are companions to a global condition and both have been used without their verification complexity being settled. We show that both are PSpace-complete for nondeterministic plants and decidable in polynomial time for deterministic plants.

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arXiv2026

On the Secret Protection Problem in Discrete-Event Systems

The secret protection problem (SPP) seeks to synthesize a minimum-cost policy ensuring that every execution from an initial state to a secret state includes a sufficient number of protected events. The problem is solvable in polynomial time under the assumption that transitions are uniquely labeled. When this assumption is relaxed, the problem becomes weakly \NP-hard. We first strengthen the result by showing that the problem is strongly \NP-hard even if all parameters are restricted to binary values. We then propose a formulation of SPP as an integer linear programming (ILP) problem, and empirically evaluate the scalability and effectiveness of the ILP-based approach on relatively large systems. Finally, we examine the complexity of a variant of SPP in which only distinct protected events contribute to clearance and show that its decision version is $Σ_{2}^{P}$-complete.

cs.FL↗

arXiv2025

Secret Protection in Labeled Petri Nets

We study the secret protection problem (SPP), where the objective is to find a policy of minimal cost ensuring that every execution path from an initial state to a secret state contains a sufficient number of protected events. The problem was originally introduced and studied in the setting of finite automata. In this paper, we extend the framework to labeled Petri nets. We consider two variants of the problem: the Parikh variant, where all occurrences of protected events along an execution path contribute to the security requirement, and the indicator variant, where each protected event is counted only once per execution path. We show that both variants can be solved in exponential space for labeled Petri nets, and that their decision versions are ExpSpace-complete. As a consequence, there is no polynomial-time or polynomial-space algorithm for these problems.

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arXiv2024

On Algorithms verifying Initial-and-Final-State Opacity: Complexity, Special Cases, and Comparison

Opacity is a general framework modeling security properties of systems interacting with a passive attacker. Initial-and-final-state opacity (IFO) generalizes the classical notions of opacity, such as current-state opacity and initial-state opacity. In IFO, the secret is whether the system evolved from a given initial state to a given final state or not. There are two algorithms for IFO verification. One arises from a trellis-based state estimator, which builds a semigroup of binary relations generated by the events of the automaton, and the other is based on the reduction to language inclusion. The time complexity of both algorithms is bounded by a super-exponential function, and it is a challenging open problem to find a faster algorithm or to show that no faster algorithm exists. We discuss the lower-bound time complexity for both general and special cases, and use extensive benchmarks to compare the existing algorithms.

cs.FL↗

arXiv2023

Verifying Weak and Strong k-Step Opacity in Discrete-Event Systems

Opacity is an important system-theoretic property expressing whether a system may reveal its secret to a passive observer (an intruder) who knows the structure of the system but has only limited observations of its behavior. Several notions of opacity have been discussed in the literature, including current-state opacity, k-step opacity, and infinite-step opacity. We investigate weak and strong k-step opacity, the notions that generalize both current-state opacity and infinite-step opacity, and ask whether the intruder is not able to decide, at any instant, when respectively whether the system was in a secret state during the last k observable steps. We design a new algorithm verifying weak k-step opacity, the complexity of which is lower than the complexity of existing algorithms and does not depend on the parameter k, and show how to use it to verify strong k-step opacity by reducing strong k-step opacity to weak k-step opacity. The complexity of the resulting algorithm is again better than the complexity of existing algorithms and does not depend on the parameter k.

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arXiv2023

Speed Me up if You Can: Conditional Lower Bounds on Opacity Verification

Opacity is a property of privacy and security applications asking whether, given a system model, a passive intruder that makes online observations of system's behaviour can ascertain some "secret" information of the system. Deciding opacity is a PSpace-complete problem, and hence there are no polynomial-time algorithms to verify opacity under the assumption that PSpace differs from PTime. This assumption, however, gives rise to a question whether the existing exponential-time algorithms are the best possible or whether there are faster, sub-exponential-time algorithms. We show that under the (Strong) Exponential Time Hypothesis, there are no algorithms that would be significantly faster than the existing algorithms. As a by-product, we obtained a new conditional lower bound on the time complexity of deciding universality (and therefore also inclusion and equivalence) for nondeterministic finite automata.

cs.FL↗

arXiv2023

Conditions for Hierarchical Supervisory Control under Partial Observation

The fundamental problem in hierarchical supervisory control under partial observation is to find conditions preserving observability between the original (low-level) and the abstracted (high-level) plants. Two conditions for observable specifications were identified in the literature -- observation consistency (OC) and local observation consistency (LOC). However, the decidability of OC and LOC were left open. We show that both OC and LOC are decidable for regular systems. We further show that these conditions do not guarantee that supremal (normal or relatively observable) sublanguages computed on the low level and on the high level always coincide. To solve the issue, we suggest a new condition -- modified observation consistency -- and show that under this condition, the supremal normal sublanguages are preserved between the levels, while the supremal relatively observable high-level sublanguage is at least as good as the supremal relatively observable low-level sublanguage, i.e., the high-level solution may be even better than the low-level solution.

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arXiv2023

Hierarchical Supervisory Control under Partial Observation: Normality

Conditions preserving observability of specifications between the plant and its abstraction are essential for hierarchical supervisory control of discrete-event systems under partial observation. Observation consistency and local observation consistency were identified as such conditions. To preserve normality, only observation consistency is required. Although observation consistency preserves normality between the levels for normal specifications, for specifications that are not normal, observation consistency is insufficient to guarantee that the supremal normal sublanguage computed on the low level and on the high level coincide. We define modified observation consistency, under which the supremal normal sublanguages of different levels coincide. We show that the verification of (modified) observation consistency is PSPACE-hard for finite automata and undecidable for slightly more expressive models than finite automata. Decidability of (modified) observation consistency is an open problem. Hence we further discuss two stronger conditions that are easy to verify. Finally, we illustrate the conditions on an example of a railroad controller and on a case study of a part of an MRI scanner.

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arXiv2023

Supervisory Control of Modular Discrete-Event Systems under Partial Observation: Normality

Complex systems are often composed of many small communicating components called modules. We investigate the synthesis of supervisory controllers for modular systems under partial observation that, as the closed-loop system, realize the supremal normal sublanguage of the specification. We call such controllers maximally permissive normal supervisors. The challenge in modular systems is to find conditions under which the global nonblocking and maximally permissive normal supervisor can be achieved locally as the parallel composition of local normal supervisors. We show that a structural concept of hierarchical supervisory control called modified observation consistency (MOC) is such a condition. However, the algorithmic verification of MOC is an open problem, and therefore it is necessary to find easily-verifiable conditions that ensure MOC. We show that the condition that all shared events are observable is such a condition. Considering specifications, we examine both local specifications, where each module has its own specification, and global specifications. We combine our results for normality with the existing results for controllability to locally synthesize the nonblocking and maximally permissive controllable and normal supervisor. Finally, we illustrate the results on an industrial case study of the patient table of an MRI scanner.

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arXiv2021

K-Step Opacity in Discrete Event Systems: Verification, Complexity, and Relations

Opacity is a property expressing whether a system may reveal its secret to a passive observer (an intruder) who knows the structure of the system but has a limited observation of its behavior. Several notions of opacity have been studied, including current-state opacity, K-step opacity, and infinite-step opacity. We study K-step opacity that generalizes both current-state opacity and infinite-step opacity, and asks whether the intruder cannot decide, at any time, whether or when the system was in a secret state during the last K observable steps. We design a new algorithm deciding K-step opacity the complexity of which is lower than that of existing algorithms and that does not depend on K. We then compare K-step opacity with other opacity notions and provide new transformations among the notions that do not use states that are neither secret nor non-secret (neutral states) and that are polynomial with respect to both the size of the system and the binary encoding of K.

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arXiv2021

Comparing the Notions of Opacity for Discrete-Event Systems

Opacity is an information flow property characterizing whether a system reveals its secret to a passive observer. Several notions of opacity have been introduced in the literature. We study the notions of language-based opacity, current-state opacity, initial-state opacity, initial-and-final-state opacity, K-step opacity, and infinite-step opacity. Comparing the notions is a natural question that has been investigated and summarized by Wu and Lafortune, who provided transformations among current-state opacity, initial-and-final-state opacity, and language-based opacity, and, for prefix-closed languages, also between language-based opacity and initial-state opacity. We extend these results by showing that all the discussed notions of opacity are transformable to each other. Besides a deeper insight into the differences among the notions, the transformations have applications in complexity results. In particular, the transformations are computable in polynomial time and preserve the number of observable events and determinism, and hence the computational complexities of the verification of the notions coincide. We provide a complete and improved complexity picture of the verification of the discussed notions of opacity, and improve the algorithmic complexity of deciding language-based opacity, infinite-step opacity, and K-step opacity.

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arXiv2021

Partially Ordered Automata and Piecewise Testability

Partially ordered automata are automata where the transition relation induces a partial order on states. The expressive power of partially ordered automata is closely related to the expressivity of fragments of first-order logic on finite words or, equivalently, to the language classes of the levels of the Straubing-Thérien hierarchy. Several fragments (levels) have been intensively investigated under various names. For instance, the fragment of first-order formulae with a single existential block of quantifiers in prenex normal form is known as piecewise testable languages or $J$-trivial languages. These languages are characterized by confluent partially ordered DFAs or by complete, confluent, and self-loop-deterministic partially ordered NFAs (ptNFAs for short). In this paper, we study the complexity of basic questions for several types of partially ordered automata on finite words; namely, the questions of inclusion, equivalence, and ($k$-)piecewise testability. The lower-bound complexity boils down to the complexity of universality. The universality problem asks whether a system recognizes all words over its alphabet. For ptNFAs, the complexity of universality decreases if the alphabet is fixed, but it is open if the alphabet may grow with the number of states. We show that deciding universality for general ptNFAs is as hard as for general NFAs. Our proof is a novel and nontrivial extension of our recent construction for self-loop-deterministic partially ordered NFAs, a model strictly more expressive than ptNFAs. We provide a comprehensive picture of the complexities of the problems of inclusion, equivalence, and ($k$-)piecewise testability for the considered types of automata.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2020

On Verification of D-Detectability for Discrete Event Systems

Detectability has been introduced as a generalization of state-estimation properties of discrete event systems studied in the literature. It asks whether the current and subsequent states of a system can be determined based on observations. Since, in some applications, to exactly determine the current and subsequent states may be too strict, a relaxed notion of D-detectability has been introduced, distinguishing only certain pairs of states rather than all states. Four variants of D-detectability have been defined: strong (periodic) D-detectability and weak (periodic) D-detectability. Deciding weak (periodic) D-detectability is PSpace-complete, while deciding strong (periodic) detectability or strong D-detectability is polynomial (and we show that it is actually NL-complete). However, to the best of our knowledge, it is an open problem whether there exists a polynomial-time algorithm deciding strong periodic D-detectability. We solve this problem by showing that deciding strong periodic D-detectability is a PSpace-complete problem, and hence there is no polynomial-time algorithm unless PSpace = P. We further show that there is no polynomial-time algorithm deciding strong periodic D-detectability even for systems with a single observable event, unless P = NP. Finally, we propose a class of systems for which the problem is tractable.

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arXiv2019

On Opacity Verification for Discrete-Event Systems

Opacity is an information flow property characterizing whether a system reveals its secret to an intruder. Verification of opacity for discrete-event systems modeled by automata is in general a hard problem. We discuss the question whether there are structural restrictions on the system models for which the opacity verification is tractable. We consider two kinds of automata models: (i) acyclic automata, and (ii) automata where all cycles are only in the form of self-loops. In some sense, these models are the simplest models of (deadlock-free) systems. Although the expressivity of such systems is weaker than the expressivity of linear temporal logic, we show that the opacity verification for these systems is still hard.

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arXiv2019

Critical Observability for Automata and Petri Nets

Critical observability is a property of cyber-physical systems to detect whether the current state belongs to a set of critical states. In safety-critical applications, critical states model operations that may be unsafe or of a particular interest. De Santis et al. introduced critical observability for linear switching systems, and Pola et al. adapted it for discrete-event systems, focusing on algorithmic complexity. We study the computational complexity of deciding critical observability for systems modeled as (networks of) finite-state automata and Petri nets. We show that deciding critical observability is (i) NL-complete for finite automata, that is, it is efficiently verifiable on parallel computers, (ii) PSPACE-complete for networks of finite automata, that is, it is very unlikely solvable in polynomial time, and (iii) undecidable for labeled Petri nets, but becoming decidable if the set of critical states (markings) is finite or co-finite, in which case the problem is as hard as the non-reachability problem for Petri nets.

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arXiv2018

Automatic Generation of Optimal Reductions of Distributions

A reduction of a source distribution is a collection of smaller sized distributions that are collectively equivalent to the source distribution with respect to the property of decomposability. That is, an arbitrary language is decomposable with respect to the source distribution if and only if it is decomposable with respect to each smaller sized distribution (in the reduction). The notion of reduction of distributions has previously been proposed to improve the complexity of decomposability verification. In this work, we address the problem of generating (optimal) reductions of distributions automatically. A (partial) solution to this problem is provided, which consists of 1) an incremental algorithm for the production of candidate reductions and 2) a reduction validation procedure. In the incremental production stage, backtracking is applied whenever a candidate reduction that cannot be validated is produced. A strengthened substitution-based proof technique is used for reduction validation, while a fixed template of candidate counter examples is used for reduction refutation; put together, they constitute our (partial) solution to the reduction verification problem. In addition, we show that a recursive approach for the generation of (small) reductions is easily supported.

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