Data Assetization via Resources-decoupled Federated Learning

Abstract

With the development of the digital economy, data is increasingly recognized as an essential resource for both work and life. However, due to privacy concerns, data owners tend to maximize the value of data through the circulation of information rather than direct data transfer. Federated learning (FL) provides an effective approach to collaborative training models while preserving privacy. However, as model parameters and training data grow, there are not only real differences in data resources between different data owners, but also mismatches between data and computing resources. These challenges lead to inadequate collaboration among data owners, compute centers, and model owners, reducing the global utility of the three parties and the effectiveness of data assetization. In this work, we first propose a framework for resource-decoupled FL involving three parties. Then, we design a Tripartite Stackelberg Model and theoretically analyze the Stackelberg-Nash equilibrium (SNE) for participants to optimize global utility. Next, we propose the Quality-aware Dynamic Resources-decoupled FL algorithm (QD-RDFL), in which we derive and solve the optimal strategies of all parties to achieve SNE using backward induction. We also design a dynamic optimization mechanism to improve the optimal strategy profile by evaluating the contribution of data quality from data owners to the global model during real training. Finally, our extensive experiments demonstrate that our method effectively encourages the linkage of the three parties involved, maximizing the global utility and value of data assets.