this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2024
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Compartmentalisation helps
If no one actually knows the plan other than the guy in charge, no one can leak the plan:
True, and interesting since this can be used as a statistical lever to ignore the exponential scaling effect of conditional probability, with a minor catch.
Lemma: Compartmentalization can reduce, even eliminate, chance of exposure introduced by conspirators.
Proof: First, we fix a mean probability p of success (avoiding accidental/deliberate exposure) by any privy to the plot.
Next, we fix some frequency k~1~, k~2~, ... , k~n~ of potential exposure events by each conspirators 1, ..., n over time t and express the mean frequency as k.
Then for n conspirators we can express the overall probability of success as
1 ⋅ p^tk~1~^ ⋅ p^tk~2~^ ⋅ ... ⋅ p^tk~n~^ = p^ntk^
Full compartmentalization reduces n to 1, leaving us with a function of time only p^tk^. ∎
Theorem: While it is possible that there exist past or present conspiracies w.h.p. of never being exposed:
Proof: The lemma holds with the following catch.
(P1) p^tk^ is still exponential over time t unless the sole conspirator, upon setting a plot in motion w.p. p^t~1~k^ = p^k^, is eliminated from the function such that p^k^ is the final (constant) probability.
(P2) For n = 1, this is really more a plot by an individual rather than a proper “conspiracy,” since no individual conspires with another. ∎