2 ms·

> Now, if we have a way to send an encrypted query to the peer and have it run on encrypted data without the peer being able to understand the query or the data

by johnmaguire2013 11y ago

> Now, if we have a way to send an encrypted query to the peer and have it run on encrypted data without the peer being able to understand the query or the data, we'd be set perhaps. Is that possible? It doesn't seem to be "N versus NP" but it seems similar. How can a computer find a correct answer to a question it doesn't know? I suppose you could send off small units of processing across many nodes, such that none of them knows the full result set...

jeswin 11y ago
Since the private data and the query are from the same user, they could share some mathematical connection perhaps, which would allow a query to be done and the results sent back (results which only the user can decrypt). Google shows up plenty of articles on the subject, but I am not an expert to know where we stand on this.
- johnmaguire2013 11y ago
  Interesting. So you'd perform operations on encrypted data, and send back an encrypted result that's useful yet different from the original encrypted data, all without ever performing decryption? It seems possible but extremely tricky.
  - zero_iq 11y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homomorphic_encryption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homomorphic_encryption My understanding is that it is possible, and Turing-complete systems can be built, but they are slow and unwieldy, requiring a large amount of cyphertext to encode data (on the order of 4KB per float, I seem to recall). It's still up for debate whether or not such techniques will eventually be up for general distributed computing, e.g. distributing a VM instance over multiple distributed servers; or just for specific use-cases, e.g. bitcoin-esque distribution of small transactions, etc.
aftbit 11y ago
This is called "homomorphic encryption". There's a lot of research in this area, but we're far from being able to efficiently perform all computations.
deleted 11y ago
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jeswin 11y ago

Since the private data and the query are from the same user, they could share some mathematical connection perhaps, which would allow a query to be done and the results sent back (results which only the user can decrypt). Google shows up plenty of articles on the subject, but I am not an expert to know where we stand on this.

johnmaguire2013 11y ago
Interesting. So you'd perform operations on encrypted data, and send back an encrypted result that's useful yet different from the original encrypted data, all without ever performing decryption? It seems possible but extremely tricky.
- zero_iq 11y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homomorphic_encryption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homomorphic_encryption My understanding is that it is possible, and Turing-complete systems can be built, but they are slow and unwieldy, requiring a large amount of cyphertext to encode data (on the order of 4KB per float, I seem to recall). It's still up for debate whether or not such techniques will eventually be up for general distributed computing, e.g. distributing a VM instance over multiple distributed servers; or just for specific use-cases, e.g. bitcoin-esque distribution of small transactions, etc.

aftbit 11y ago

This is called "homomorphic encryption". There's a lot of research in this area, but we're far from being able to efficiently perform all computations.

deleted 11y ago

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