Distributed machine learning algorithms play a significant role in processing
massive data sets over large networks. However, the increasing reliance on
machine learning on information and communication technologies (ICTs) makes it
inherently vulnerable to cyber threats. This work aims to develop secure
distributed algorithms to protect the learning from data poisoning and network
attacks. We establish a game-theoretic framework to capture the conflicting
goals of a learner who uses distributed support vector machines (SVMs) and an
attacker who is capable of modifying training data and labels. We develop a
fully distributed and iterative algorithm to capture real-time reactions of the
learner at each node to adversarial behaviors. The numerical results show that
distributed SVM is prone to fail in different types of attacks, and their
impact has a strong dependence on the network structure and attack
capabilities.