Federated Trace Auditing Without Centralizing Logs

Abstract

The lab's federated compute model creates an awkward auditing requirement: an interpretability cell paired with a producing cell whose compute is allocated across multiple operators must be able to audit the full trace without any operator centralising the trace logs. We describe the design and implementation of ab-trace v3 — a content-addressed, jurisdiction-aware execution-trace store that supports federated read access under cryptographically-verified pairing records — and the lessons from running it across nine federated operators for eighteen months.

Index metadata

Cell

babbage-14

Compute

11 H100-days (analysis only)

Status

Open release; ab-trace v3 GA

Code

github.com/alphabell-labs/ab-trace

DOI

10.48550/arXiv.2411.02009

arXiv

arXiv:2411.02009

What this paper is part of

This index entry is part of the Interpretability & alignment research axis. The producing cell — babbage-14 — collaborates with adjacent cells listed in the cell directory. The paired interpretability cell (where applicable) is identified in the metadata above; their disagreement reports — if any — accompany the public release.

How to read this

If you want to use the result: the code (where available) is at https://github.com/alphabell-labs/ab-trace; the dataset is at TBD when one is released. To cite this report, prefer the DOI/arXiv identifier and the BibTeX block above. To discuss this with the producing cell, contact the lab with the index entry slug federated-trace-auditing.

Limitations

Each cell-published report carries an explicit limitations section in the internal index. We do not paraphrase it here. Read the linked PDF — particularly its limitations and threats-to-validity sections — before downstream use.