Cryptographic algorithms are basis for IP cores by Xiphera
Finnish developer Xiphera has released the xQlave product family for post-quantum cryptographic (PQC) IP cores.
The xQlave family offers a comprehensive collection of quantum-secure key exchange and digital signatures, implemented as IP cores for FPGA and ASIC hardware. The family introduces IP cores for the PQC algorithms recently announced as the winners of the PQC competition by the American National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Crystals-Kyber and the Crystals-Dilithium digital signature algorithms.
The xQlave IP cores allow Xiphera’s partners and customers to design future-proof systems that are protected against the threat of quantum computers. The rapid development of quantum computers is generating new opportunities as well as threats to the current ecosystems, pointed out the company. Quantum computers will be able to break current public-key (asymmetric) cryptosystems based on integer factorisation and discrete logarithms, compromising the entire basis of information and network security, Xiphera warned. Concerns have been raised about malicious actors possibly targeting and capturing sensitive data already, with the aim of decrypting it when sufficient quantum computing power is available. This has led to the NSA in the US and ANSSI in France to recommend systems should have the capability to be upgraded with quantum-secure cryptography.
PQC is implemented and executed on classical computing platforms to protect against attacks that use quantum computing. Kimmo Järvinen, co-founder and CTO of Xiphera, said: “Designers of secure systems need to prepare for the post-quantum future already today” and he believed the xQlave family answers to this need.
xQlave consists of secure and efficient implementations of PQC algorithms. The first product in the product family is for Crystals-Kyber key encapsulation algorithm, one of the four winners of the NIST PQC competition. The IP core will be available for customer evaluation in January 2023.
There will be new IP cores for Crystals-Kyber in 2023 and the company plans to introduce cores for the second NIST winner algorithm, Crystals-Dilithium digital signature algorithm.
“The xQlave product family forms the core of Xiphera’s product offering for public-key cryptography in the future and used together with traditional elliptic curve cryptography in hybrid encryption schemes, offers protection against quantum-computing attacks already today”, Järvinen continued.
Xiphera is a Finnish company designing hardware-based security solutions using standardised cryptographic algorithms. It says it has cryptographic expertise and experience in system design as well as deep knowledge in the field of reprogrammable logic, enabling it to protect customers’ critical information and assets.
Its product portfolio consists of secure and efficient cryptographic IP cores, designed directly for FPGAs and ASICs.
