I know, this isn't really about Windows. But it's pretty darn cool, and Microsoft is doing it.
Posted on 11/16/2015 6:55:34 PM PST by dayglored
Practical homomorphic encryption manual released
As genome research - and the genomes themselves - get passed around the scientific community, the world's woken up to the security and privacy risks this can involve. A Microsoft research quintet has therefore published ways to help scientists work on genomic data while reducing the risk of data theft.
The team published an informal manual to help scientists and other researchers to use the Simple Encrypted Arithmetic Library (SEAL).
Homomorphic encryption is a technique in which software can operate on encrypted data without decrypting it. This would let hospitals and labs to work on encrypted data hosted on untrusted clouds, receiving only the decrypted results for analysis.
This means the teams could assist with secure and private outsourcing of personal health records and predictive services for disease risk.
The Redmond research team of Nathan Dowlin, Ran Gilad-Bachrach, Kim Laine, Kristin Lauter, Michael Naehrig and John Wernsing describe the findings in the paper Manual for Using Homomorphic Encryption for Bioinformatics [pdf] spotted by ITnews. Here's a sample of their thinking:
A wealth of personal genomic data is becoming available thanks to scientific advances in sequencing the human genome and gene assembly techniques. Hospitals, research institutes, clinics, and companies handling human genomic material and other sensitive health data are all faced with the common problem of securely storing, and interacting, with large amounts of data... we present new methods for encoding real data which lead to concrete improvements in both performance and storage requirements."They say previous homomorphic encryption deployments were hand-tuned, inflexible, and private in-house works.
Research into the security threats against medical devices and separately the data it holds has been increasing.
In September researchers Scott Erven and Mark Collao detailed how they found exposed online thousands of critical medical systems, including Magnetic Resonance Imaging machines and nuclear medicine devices.
The pair found a "very large" unnamed US healthcare organisation exposing more than 68,000 medical systems. That US org has some 12,000 staff and 3,000 physicians.
Technical information on how the encryption works is available in the paper.
I know, this isn't really about Windows. But it's pretty darn cool, and Microsoft is doing it.
The NSA has a back door, of course.
We don’t need none of that homomorphic stuff ‘round here!
Homomorphic? Is that what they’re calling Bruce Jenner now?
“Homomorphic” and NSA has the “back door”? That seems queer.
Could you do a Tech Ping for this? Somebody has to introduce some dignity into this conversation... :-)
bump for:
Damn impressive.
Microsoft is doing some interesting things. Did you see any of this?
Microsoft Azure Courts a Nascent Blockchain Market
http://www.eweek.com/cloud/microsoft-azure-courts-a-nascent-blockchain-market.html
“Microsoft has teamed up with ConsenSys, a Brooklyn-based blockchain development specialist, to offer Ethereum Blockchain as a Service on Azure. Ethereum is a framework for building blockchain-based applications.
Financial services companies are keeping an eye on blockchain technology, and not only because it is integral to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Many in financial technology circles are exploring blockchain-based banking and trading systems to help further automate, modernize and secure the industry.
Microsoft and ConsenSys want to give them a friendly nudge”
Do some research on Cerner. They’re based out of Kansas. If you think your medical data is free from spying, you’re a rube.
I think nothing of the sort, Skippy.
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