HashCash Gears Up for McAfee Collaboration on Next-Gen Quantum Security
The more we advance towards Digital tomorrow, the concern over data security grows. Frequent instances of data breaches over the years were proof enough that the tell-tale security protocols and firewalls guarding the applications and web platforms were falling short of assuring absolute safety to the users. It was around the same time that blockchain emerged as a solution provider to the security concerns, promising ultimate security with its unique core properties.
Since the world came to acknowledge the power of blockchain; the distributed ledger technology has been incorporated across major industries, such as financial services, banking, supply chain, insurance, healthcare, etc. In recent years, blockchain has made its mark by becoming synonymous with enhanced security.
Owing to leading blockchain development companies like HashCash Consultants, the technology has been advocated for and integrated with banking systems, financial and government infrastructure, and supply chain management across industries to prevent fraud and data breaches. Pilot projects are happening globally to incorporate blockchain into elections to fortify the security and integrity of the process. Notable developments in other sectors attest to the fact that blockchain is the sustainable solution for internet data security, but for how long?
The Quantum Threat to Blockchain Security
The present blockchain-powered encryption algorithms depend on public-key cryptography to ensure data security. Public-key cryptography or asymmetric cryptography revolves around two sets of keys, out of which one of private and the other is public. These keys are used to encrypt and decrypt data to validate identities or execute other tasks. Asymmetric cryptography involves hard-to-solve. The decryption of the data depends on solving the problem. This is a complex process that is hard for the existing computers, even the most powerful ones to crack. Even if one can use one, the time it will take is not worth the trouble or effort. Here’s where the promise of absolute security of blockchain originates.
However, the emergence of quantum computers might pose a threat to blockchain supremacy, making the augmented security vulnerable. If and when a powerful enough quantum computer comes into existence, it would take seconds to break through the most powerful of codes and decrypt data very easily. This impending problem has been known to us for years. While there is no way of avoiding it, there are ways to find a solution within the problem itself.
In recent years, blockchain experts and companies such as HashCash Consultants have commenced a well-coordinated effort to create blockchain-based cryptographic standards that can resist quantum mechanics. HashCash for one is working to converge blockchain with quantum encryption to build a robust and unbreakable security protocol, for which it is planning to work with computer security companies like McAfee.
Enhanced Cyber-Security with QKD
One cannot dismiss the security insinuations concerning blockchain and quantum computing; nevertheless, it can be resolved by reforming blockchain encryption security through the addition of quantum elements. Quantum mechanics is being harnessed to create the ultimate cybersecurity system to counter both the present and as well as future threats. Blockchain is the current supreme security provider both can be combined to develop and fortify architecture that will obliterate any scope of cyber-attacks in the near future.
Leveraging the laws of physics quantum technology has given birth to quantum key distribution and random number generation, which are not vulnerable to attacks by quantum computers and mathematical algorithms. This allows for the creation of a strong and futuristic new paradigm of security and trust.
These approaches are derived from enhanced cybersecurity software and next-gen cryptographic encryption strategies also known as post-quantum algorithms, which have blockchain elements in it. It delivers a highly resilient online security infrastructure that is capable of protecting the connected societies and digital lives. Quantum technologies develop the core of quantum principles, which can be implemented to ensure the safety and security of digital communications.
The quantum key distribution (QKD) technology utilizes the quantum elements to safeguard the most vulnerable and critical link within the chain of security, which is the exchange of encryption keys between the source and the destination. These quantum properties can also be used to harness high-speed streams of random bits that will further be used to create superior quality encryption keys, virtually impossible to decrypt without the matching key, even with a quantum computer. Since the bits are random and unpredictable, it ensures the absolute security of the keys.
HashCash’s Viewpoint on Quantum Security
HashCash has been working on QKD, integrating the quantum elements with their very own blockchain network to protect it from any future incursion from a quantum computer. At present, HashCash applications and infrastructure are backed by blockchain technology that leverages the public-key cryptography. An arrangement of both public and private key is used to execute the processing of financial or data transmission from source to the destination while ensuring the required security and privacy stabilizing protocols.
HashCash blockchain network HC Net with its cutting-edge private key security architecture facilitates each transaction. However, with the world advancing towards quantum mechanics, these encryptions may, in the future, become susceptible. Therefore, HashCash has been working on quantum encryption to fortify the private-key security while keeping the blockchain elements intact. It uses QKD to enhance private-key security. Due to the inherent complexities and several probabilities in quantum physics, the cyber-attacker cannot copy the key. It would require extensive computation, and when doing so breaking the laws of quantum physics to decrypt the key, this entire drill makes hacking virtually impossible.
It is an ingenious way to ensure security to both simple as well as the most complicated computer systems in the world, making it strong to resist an attack from a quantum computer. HashCash has leveraged the elements of both blockchain cryptographic encryption and quantum mechanics to build a superior security system. It is a work in progress, and there are plans that the company might collaborate with leading cybersecurity specialists like McAfee and likewise on the same.
