Optalysys partners with Duality Technologies to accelerate adoption of Fully Homomorphic Encryption
Leeds-based startup Optalysys is developing a silicon photonic chip which speeds up FHE, allowing data to always be in use and protected
Leeds, 29 October 2024: Optalysys, a company enabling the future of secure computing, has partnered with Duality Technologies, a leader in privacy-preserving data collaboration, to drive the adoption and application of Fully Homomorphic Encryption technologies (FHE). The partnership aims to make FHE more accessible and commercially viable across various industries, including healthcare and finance.
Fully Homomorphic Encryption is an advanced, quantum-resilient cryptography method that allows encrypted data to be processed without ever needing to be decrypted or exposed. FHE ensures sensitive or confidential data remains secure when shared over untrusted networks or used in multi-party collaborations – unlocking new opportunities in how data is processed on the cloud.
Historically, scaling FHE has been challenging due to its demand for specialist skills, infrastructure and computing power. The partnership aims to address this challenge by integrating Optalysys’ cloud technology, Explore, into Duality’s software products and the open-source OpenFHE homomorphic encryption software library to accelerate FHE applications for customers. It will also promote the standardisation of FHE protocols across the ecosystem to enable high-security applications across various sectors.
The demand for secure data sharing and collaboration continues to rise, driven by new regulatory frameworks such as the Digital Operations Resilience Act (DORA), due to come into force in early 2025. DORA requires every financial institution to implement a wide range of cybersecurity tools to protect data from disruptions and threats, including data in use. FHE keeps data encrypted throughout every stage of processing, making it suitable for high-stakes sectors like financial services, healthcare, and government. The partnership will enable sector-specific applications, such as fraud detection, risk modelling, confidential investigations, and pandemic response – and perhaps most significantly provide secure customisation of AI models such as LLMs, where the exposure and misuse of data is now being recognised as a real threat.
Dr Nick New, CEO of Optalysys, says, “FHE is a truly revolutionary technology that has the power to unlock the true value of data, whilst maintaining privacy and security. Duality is one of the world leaders in privacy-enhancing data collaboration and has an established and successful history working within financial services and government sectors. Currently, the building of FHE models requires a high level of cryptographic expertise. We need to get to a point where deployment of FHE is an automated process, part of the fabric of the internet. The development of OpenFHE has been a significant step towards this and allows all the FHE methods to be hosted from a single, open source platform. Our goal is to provide an agnostic acceleration technology to benefit all FHE methods and libraries.”
Dr Kurt Rohloff, Co-founder and CTO of Duality Technologies, says, “Partnering with Optalysys is an exciting step forward in making FHE solutions more accessible and scalable for real-world applications. We both strongly believe in the power of open-source solutions and standards. By integrating Optalysys’ cloud technology with our software products and OpenFHE, we aim to drive transparency and flexibility across the ecosystem, which will enable the wider adoption of FHE.”
About Optalysys
Founded in Leeds, UK, Optalysys enables the future of secure computing by processing encrypted data at scale, without it being decrypted. It does this by using the power of advanced silicon photonics to enable Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE), a cryptographic technology to allow organisations to securely commercialise their data. Founded in 2013 by Dr. Nick New (CEO) and Robert Todd (CTO), Optalysys has raised funding from investors including Northern Gritstone, Lingotto, Verve Ventures and imec.xpand. Its most recent round was a £21m Series A in July 2023. Optalysys has developed an Innovation Lab, a secure platform for users to experiment with its prototype FHE accelerator hardware powered by silicon photonics.
For more information, please visit https://optalysys.com/
About Duality Technologies
Duality Technologies is at the forefront of Privacy-Enhancing Technologies (PETs) development and application to real-world scenarios, enabling organizations to collaborate and use sensitive data while preserving privacy and regulatory compliance. By uniquely combining advanced cryptographic and confidential computing techniques with AI and machine learning methods, Duality provides solutions that allow data to be analyzed and shared securely without exposing the underlying sensitive information. Duality empowers businesses and government agencies to unlock the value of data for public good, driving innovation, security, and better decision-making all while improving data protections and governance.
For more information, visit https://dualitytech.com
