Soft detection physical layer insecurity

Abstract: We establish that during the execution of any Guessing Random Additive Noise Decoding (GRAND) algorithm, an interpretable, useful measure of decoding confidence can be evaluated. This measure takes the form of a log-likelihood ratio (LLR) of the hypotheses that, should a decoding be found by a given query, the decoding is correct versus its being incorrect. That LLR can be used as soft output for a range of applications and we demonstrate its utility by showing that it can be used to confidently discard likely erroneous decodings in favor of returning more readily managed erasures. We show that feature can be used to compromise the physical layer security of short length wiretap codes by accurately and confidently revealing a proportion of a communication when code-rate is far above the Shannon capacity of the associated hard detection channel.