PIR codes from combinatorial structures

A $k$-server Private Information Retrieval (PIR) code is a binary linear $[m,s]$-code admitting a generator matrix such that for every integer $i$ with $1\le i\le s$ there exist $k$ disjoint subsets of columns (called recovery sets) that add up to the vector of weight one, with the single $1$ in position $i$. As shown in \cite{Fazeli1}, a $k$-server PIR code is useful to reduce the storage overhead of a traditional $k$-server PIR protocol. Finding $k$-server PIR codes with a small blocklength for a given dimension has recently become an important research challenge. In this work, we propose new constructions of PIR codes from combinatorial structures, introducing the notion of $k$-partial packing. Several bounds over the existing literature are improved.