And how would you know if the algorithm was tampered with?
Quantum computing is the new heir apparent to AI in terms of number of wild security claims. Several years ago, you could add AI to a marketing sentence and then sell products of vacuous import. That crown is oozing toward quantum. Throw in encryption and you get a raise, maybe even an IPO. At RSA, however, there’s a real quantum computing group working on real problems – the problem of whether “random” numbers, used as input for cryptographic algorithms generated by quantum computing – can be forged.
While other quantum computing systems go to the trouble of generating a pretty darned random number for use in cryptographic keys (which is very definitely a good thing), they’re not very good at attesting to whether the resulting number has been tampered with. Mess with the “random” number and you can rig the cryptographic keys to be broken.
Enter Cambridge Quantum Computing. At RSA they’ve trotted out a machine that generates a sort of unalterable proof for each generated number in the form of a horizontally and vertically polarized photon pair – modify one and you can tell. Quantum entanglement is such that you can do that. This means you can get certifiably random keys. You don’t have to trust anyone, so a first provably Zero Trust Security device is a welcome addition here.
How do you check? Using the Bell Inequality method for verifying random keys that was thought up in 1964. Even if you don’t know what that is, the point is there’s a way to verify integrity ..
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