QuSecure PQC now protecting legacy systems at U.S. government site
QuSecure announced that the U.S. federal government has begun orchestrating the world’s first-ever post-quantum encryption communication over a government network by using the company’s QuProtect post-quantum cryptography (PQC) solution.
The announcement comes just one week after the National Institute of Standards and Technology unveiled its initial PQC encryption and digital signature standards, and just two weeks after QuSecure landed a rare and coveted Small Business Innovation Research Phase III procurement contract from the federal government. The deployment is a direct result of that contract arrangement.
QuSecure’s PQC algorithm is being used by the U.S. government on its legacy systems at a combined Air Force, Space Force and NORAD location. QuProtect’s quantum tunnel has enabled a “quantum-resilient deployment with 100% uptime protecting data that previously used standard encryption, with no increased bandwidth or latency issues,” the company said. “Data currently being transmitted cannot be decrypted by others unless they have the QuProtect system, and any adversary collecting the protected data to store will be unlikely to decrypt it in the future, even with a quantum computer.”
“This is extremely significant because the U.S. Government has not employed a post-quantum communications channel on premises before,” said Pete Ford, QuSecure Head of Federal Operations.
QuSecure’s announcement also came a day after Crypto Quantique announced what it claimed is the first IoT security platform based on the new NIST PQC standards, and it is very likely that the weeks ahead will bring more announcements from PQC companies offering new standards-based platforms, or potentially even new customers for their PQC solutions.
Dan O’Shea has covered telecommunications and related topics including semiconductors, sensors, retail systems, digital payments and quantum computing/technology for over 25 years.
