Trust-Aware Routing for Distributed Generative AI Inference at the Edge

TL;DR

G-TRAC is a trust-aware routing framework for distributed generative AI inference at the edge, improving robustness and reliability in decentralized environments.

Contribution

It introduces a polynomial-time routing algorithm and a hybrid trust architecture tailored for dynamic, heterogeneous edge networks.

Findings

Significantly improves inference completion rates.

Effectively isolates unreliable peers.

Maintains robustness under node failures and network partitions.

Abstract

Emerging deployments of Generative AI increasingly execute inference across decentralized and heterogeneous edge devices rather than on a single trusted server. In such environments, a single device failure or misbehavior can disrupt the entire inference process, making traditional best-effort peer-to-peer routing insufficient. Coordinating distributed generative inference therefore requires mechanisms that explicitly account for reliability, performance variability, and trust among participating peers. In this paper, we present G-TRAC, a trust-aware coordination framework that integrates algorithmic path selection with system-level protocol design to ensure robust distributed inference. First, we formulate the routing problem as a \textit{Risk-Bounded Shortest Path} computation and introduce a polynomial-time solution that combines trust-floor pruning with Dijkstra's search, achieving sub-millisecond median routing latency at practical edge scales, and remaining below 10 ms at larger scales. Second, to operationally support the routing logic in dynamic environments, the framework employs a \textit{Hybrid Trust Architecture} that maintains global reputation state at stable anchors while disseminating lightweight updates to edge peers via background synchronization. Experimental evaluation on a heterogeneous testbed of commodity devices demonstrates that G-TRAC significantly improves inference completion rates, effectively isolates unreliable peers, and sustains robust execution even under node failures and network partitions.