Xiphera secures funding for groundbreaking cryptographic technology development

Xiphera, a Finnish company, renowned for its work in cybersecurity and cryptography, has secured funding from Business Finland. The aid supports the development of cutting-edge hardware-accelerated cryptographic technology. The project will run over an 18-month timeframe with a budget of €460,470.

At the heart of this initiative lies the acceleration of Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) and Zero-Knowledge Proof (ZKP) computation methods on FPGA and ASIC platforms. These advancements promise a leap in data processing, allowing operations to be performed on encrypted data. This approach is not only faster but also more energy-efficient than existing software-based solutions.

“The funding enables both deep and applied research activities in a technologically challenging area of cryptography. We expect this research to lead to a significant leap toward commercializable FHE and ZKP solutions,” says Petri Jehkonen, Director of Strategic Programs at Xiphera.

The potential use cases and commercial opportunities from this technology could include the following.

• Fully Homomorphic Encryption: FHE empowers entities like banks or hospitals to process data directly while maintaining its encrypted state. This ensures that sensitive information remains safe from prying eyes.
• Zero-Knowledge Proof: ZKP offers a way to verify information without revealing the data itself. For example, banks can affirm the validity of a customer’s details or a transaction without exposing any additional information.

Xiphera aims to explore promising methods of hardware-accelerated FHE and ZKP, planning to develop a Proof-of-Concept accelerator and demonstrate it within an FPGA environment. Moreover, the initiative will deliver a thorough evaluation framework and analyse potential applications for commercial viability.

By achieving these benchmarks, Xiphera is poised to establish itself at the vanguard of cryptographic advancements on the global stage. The promise of unlocking new business opportunities in both private and public domains underscores the project's remarkable potential.