Google’s fully homomorphic encryption compiler – a primer (jeremykun.com)

Article summary

Google has developed a fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) compiler that converts C++ programs into FHE-compatible code, allowing computations to be performed on encrypted data without decrypting it. The compiler uses a technique called gate bootstrapping and supports various FHE cryptosystem implementations. The article provides an overview of the compiler's internals and demonstrates its usage with two examples: adding two integers and capitalizing a string. The compiler is still in its early stages, and performance is a significant concern, with simple computations taking several seconds to complete.

Main themes

• Fully Homomorphic Encryption
• Compiler Design
• Secure Computation
• Performance Optimization
• Cloud Computing Security
• Cryptography
• Hardware Acceleration
• Sensitive Data Processing

What commenters say

• FHE is still too slow for practical applications, with even simple computations taking several seconds to complete.
• The security benefits of FHE may outweigh its performance drawbacks, making it useful for sensitive computations.
• FHE could be accelerated with hardware support, such as ASICs or FPGAs, to make it more viable for real-world use.
• The current implementation of FHE has significant limitations, including large public keys and slow bootstrapping times.
• FHE has the potential to enable new types of secure computations, such as secure multi-party computation and private data analysis.
• The use of FHE in cloud computing could provide a secure way to perform computations on sensitive data without exposing it to the cloud provider.
• The performance of FHE can be improved with better optimization techniques and more efficient algorithms.
• FHE is not suitable for all types of computations, and its limitations need to be carefully considered before adopting it for a particular use case.