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Library OS for Confidential Computing: Enhancing Data Security with Cutting-Edge Projects

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Author:  Sal Kimmich

Introduction

As the landscape of data security continues to evolve, the concept of a Library OS (operating system) for Confidential Computing is gaining traction. Library OS projects create secure environments for applications by providing “auto” enclaves for process isolation. These enclaves, also known as runtimes or sandboxes, ensure that sensitive data remains protected even during processing. In this blog, we explore the significance of Library OS for confidential computing and highlight three key projects: Gramine, Occlum, and Enarx.

What is a Library OS?

A Library OS, or “libOS,” is a streamlined operating system that runs applications within secure enclaves. These enclaves isolate processes, providing a trusted execution environment (TEE) that safeguards data from unauthorized access and tampering. This approach is particularly valuable for confidential computing, where data must remain secure throughout its lifecycle, including during computation.

Key Projects in Library OS for Confidential Computing

Gramine
  • Overview: Gramine is an open-source Library OS designed to run applications in trusted execution environments. It supports Intel SGX and enables the secure execution of unmodified applications.
  • Features: Gramine provides robust security by isolating applications within enclaves, ensuring that data remains protected even if the underlying host is compromised. Its compatibility with existing applications makes it a versatile choice for enhancing data security.
  • GitHub: Gramine Project
Occlum
  • Overview: Occlum is a memory-safe, multi-process Library OS that supports Intel SGX. It aims to provide a secure and efficient environment for running applications within enclaves.
  • Features: Occlum ensures data confidentiality and integrity by isolating processes and providing strong security guarantees. Its design focuses on performance and scalability, making it suitable for a wide range of applications.
  • GitHub: Occlum Project
Enarx
  • Overview: While not a traditional Library OS, Enarx uses WebAssembly (Wasm) to provide similar benefits. It enables the secure execution of applications in TEEs, ensuring data privacy and integrity.
  • Features: Enarx leverages Wasm to create secure runtimes that can run across different hardware platforms. Its approach simplifies the deployment of secure applications, making it a compelling option for confidential computing.
  • GitHub: Enarx Project

The Importance of Library OS in Confidential Computing

Library OS projects like Gramine, Occlum, and Enarx play a crucial role in the realm of confidential computing. They offer a layer of security that ensures sensitive data remains protected during processing. By isolating applications within secure enclaves, these projects mitigate risks associated with data breaches and unauthorized access.

Conclusion

The concept of a Library OS for confidential computing represents a significant advancement in data security. Projects like Gramine, Occlum, and Enarx demonstrate the potential of this approach to enhance privacy and protect sensitive information. As the need for secure data processing continues to grow, these projects will play an increasingly vital role in ensuring the confidentiality and integrity of data in various applications.

Stay tuned for more insights into the world of confidential computing and the innovative projects that are driving this field forward.

Partisia Joins the Confidential Computing Consortium as a Start-up Tier Member

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We are pleased to welcome Partisia, a global pioneer in Multiparty Computation (MPC) and advanced cryptographic privacy, as a Start-up Tier member of the Confidential Computing Consortium (CCC). Their membership strengthens the CCC’s efforts to advance secure, privacy-preserving computing by bringing Partisia’s expertise in cutting-edge cryptographic solutions to the forefront of our initiatives.

Founded in 2008, Partisia has a long history of delivering commercial-grade MPC software solutions, with an initial focus on secure, high-stake auctions used for trading energy and spectrum licenses. Over the years, Partisia’s MPC solutions have evolved, becoming the foundation for various services, including key management, data activation, statistics, and various bespoke applications such as DeFi, voting, and e-cash.

Partisia’s commercial activities have also led to the creation of successful spinouts, such as Sepior, which was acquired by Blockdaemon in 2022, and the Partisia Blockchain Foundation. This Swiss-based foundation governs and launches a public blockchain built by Partisia.

By joining the Confidential Computing Consortium, Partisia aligns itself with a global community dedicated to defining and accelerating the adoption of confidential computing. This membership further solidifies Partisia’s commitment to addressing weak and single points of failure across digital infrastructures through commercializing advanced cryptographic technologies.

We eagerly anticipate the valuable contributions that Partisia will bring to the CCC and the broader tech community. As they continue to push the boundaries of secure, privacy-preserving computing, we are excited to see the innovative solutions they will develop.

Confidential Computing Consortium Resources

Enabling Verifiable, User-Owned and Tradable AI Agents in Games – with Veriplay, Polygon, Immutable and Super Protocol

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Author:  Nukri Basharuli, Founder and CEO, Super Protocol

 

 

True Web3 Games, with their potential for rich gaming experiences, advanced AI agents, and genuine digital asset ownership, can only reach their full potential through the implementation of Confidential Computing in a truly decentralized manner. The Confidential Computing Consortium, alongside its member Super Protocol, is at the forefront of this revolution, demonstrating how these technologies can unlock new business opportunities.

Super Protocol serves a dual role in the evolving digital landscape. As a confidential and self-sovereign AI Cloud, it focuses on decentralization, privacy, and verifiability. Its computing network of commonly adopted types of GPU and CPU operates in a confidential mode under the orchestration of Smart Contracts on the Polygon blockchain. This makes Super a decentralized alternative to centralized clouds like Amazon AWS for Web3 AI projects. Additionally, as an AI Marketplace, Super Protocol differs from traditional AI marketplaces like Hugging Face by offering AI models and Data owners the unique ability to share and monetize their assets in a fully confidential, self-sovereign mode. The value of Super Protocol is well illustrated by the examples of its clients.

In this blog, we’ll explore how Super Protocol’s AI cloud is set to transform the gaming industry, enabling a secure and self-sovereign experience that could redefine the future of digital entertainment.

Example: Veriplay 

About Veriplay 

Veriplay is a startup that is developing a gaming platform compatible with Immutable and Polygon. This platform will enable creating AI agents in Web3 Games that can be traded on the open market as dynamic NFTs

The Veriplay team, with a proven track record of working with industry giants like Playrix, Warner Brothers, Google, and Crytek, is on a mission to revolutionize the gaming landscape by introducing verifiable and tradable AI agents

This innovative approach aims to address the limitations of traditional gaming experiences and empower players with unprecedented control over their in-game assets

Super Protocol and Veriplay research and testing efforts have utilized NVIDIA’s H100 GPUs, provided by the NVIDIA Confidential Computing team (more details in Super Protocol Press-release: 

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/superprotocol_confidentialcomputing-depin-nvidiainception -activity-7169336537371914242-LBV3?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop 

Project Goal 

Veriplay’s goal is to give players the ability to truly own AI game agents. To do so, it aims to develop a reliable, Web3-compatible gaming platform for integrating verifiable tokenized AI agents into games with the following characteristics: 

  • Player AI Models are Protected from Unauthorized Alterations: Veriplay wants to protect player AI models from any unauthorized modifications, whether initiated by the game developer or external malicious actors. 
  • AI Model Training is Verifiable: This means that it is possible to verify how the AI agents were trained, which guarantees their fairness and transparency. 
  • Decentralization (Smart Contract Orchestration): Smart contracts will govern the execution

of AI computations and data storage, ensuring transparency and immutability, and eliminating human administration layer. 

  • Free trading of AI NFTs on marketplaces : Veriplay revolutionizes AI agent ownership by transforming them into tradable digital assets managed by players through dynamic NFTs. 

It is evident that without AI computation privacy, verifiability of AI model training history, and smart contract management, the integrity of AI agents as digital assets will be irrevocably compromised, shattering market trust and leading to market rejection of such assets. 

The Centralized Infrastructure Problem 

There are several problems with creating trusted AI agents in centralized infrastructure, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) or Google Cloud: 

  • Difficulty of Verification: It is difficult to verify that AI agents have been trained and operate according to the rules of the game declared by the developer. This is especially important when AI agents become tradable assets or when they are used in competitions with prize money. 
  • Risk of Developer Manipulation: Developers have the ability to alter or duplicate an AI agent trained by a player who has invested time and money into the training process. For instance, a developer could duplicate a successful model that frequently wins competitions and sell it to other players as this developer’s original creation. 
  • Player’s Inability to Own Agents: In centralized AI agent infrastructures, players lack true ownership of their agents, being confined to developer-defined capabilities and pricing models. While creating a simple NFT for AI agent ownership partially addresses this, it falls short of true self-custodial ownership. For this type of ownership to be achieved, the AI NFT must be dynamic, linked to all AI agent components, maintain security and verifiability, and prevent human administration access – all impossible within centralized frameworks. 

To sum it up, centralized infrastructure poses significant risks that not only diminish the value of players’ time and investments in training their agents, but also severely restrict monetization opportunities for both players and game studios. 

Conversely, with the implementation of trustless AI Agents in games, both players and developers could generate additional income by trading dynamic AI NFTs on marketplaces, renting out Agents to each other, ghosting and participating in the championships with cash prize funds, and more. 

Super Protocol and Veriplay Solution 

In contrast to AI agents confined within centralized infrastructures and under the complete control of game developers, Web3-compatible gaming agents powered by Super Protocol and the Veriplay platform will exhibit the following advantages:

  1. Confidentiality and Sovereignty of AI Agent – players retain exclusive sovereignty over their AI agents, encompassing models, data, and computational resources, effectively eliminating the possibility of third-party manipulation. 
  • Confidential Enclave Technology: Web3-compliant AI agents are computed in confidential enclaves. Confidential enclaves operate based on the Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) technology supported by Nvidia H100 GPU chips. TEE allows creating a secure area inside the processor for safe storage, processing, and protection of confidential data. Even physical access to the server will not grant access to the applications running in the enclaves. No one except the owner of the Agent knows on which servers their data is being processed, as TEE ensures complete isolation of sensitive data and models. 
  • Access and control over the system are only granted to the smart contract and verified applications loaded into it. The computational resources used for the Agent’s operation are automatically authenticated by the protocol, ensuring the user that they are processing their model and data securely. By design, these resources cannot be tampered with or exploited maliciously. The owner alone manages the model, data, and interactions of their gaming agent. 

As a result, users can be confident that the game developer cannot alter or copy the model since they do not have access to it. 

  1. Verifiability of AI Agent training and game interactions – maintaining the verifiability of the Agent throughout the chain from the storage to the server is guaranteed by the following functions: 
  • The client application and the server are mutually authenticated on a TLS connection. They exchange messages signed with a secret key. Messages contain information about the hardware, application, and its settings. 
  • After mutual authentication, the game application computing process initiates. The outcome will be signed using the enclave key, maintaining the chain of trust. This trust continuity prevents unauthorized alterations, ensuring players can rely on the computation’s result. 

Therefore, the verifiability of the AI Agent’s track record and its immutable nature reassure players that acquiring an AI Agent guarantees possession of an asset with the promised properties. Moreover, by investing in its continuous training, they can have confidence that the future market price of the Agent will accurately reflect their training endeavors. 

  1. The decentralization and removal of human administration are achieved through orchestration by a smart contract system. Via smart contracts, Super Protocol entirely separates the gaming process from server and cloud owners, guaranteeing trust, flexibility and reliability. 
  • Smart Contracts oversee the distribution of the system’s computing resources, assigning confidential nodes for computing tasks.
  • Supporting the necessary Service Level Agreement (SLA) and scalability is accomplished by grouping nodes into clusters and pools with automated Disaster Recovery (DR) mechanisms. 
  • Additionally, the capability to establish geo-distributed clusters with efficient local gateways is provided. 
  • The protocol also ensures secure storage through multiple network replication, encryption, and restricted access to trusted applications. 

With these features, the capacity to deploy a fault-tolerant game server, storage, and agents without dependence on specific hosts is achieved, embodying the finest decentralized cloud architecture available today. 

  1. Ownership management via NFTs and smart contracts is central to the project. The entire process of AI agents’ ownership management and the orchestration of the marketplace where they are traded, is exclusively governed by the project’s smart contracts. 

Each agent consists of on-chain data — an NFT with its own wallet, and data in storage, including a model and game interaction history. Any modifications to the model are made within the chain of trust, beginning with the initial record. These changes are exclusively executed through a smart contract, with each alteration recorded in the agent’s track record and the blockchain. 

Listing of an agent on the marketplace and transferring ownership is seamlessly and securely conducted through a smart contract, ensuring the safety of all participants. 

To sum it up, the deployment of a seamless and secure confidential, verifiable, decentralized computing service, combined with state and ownership management through smart contracts, creates a competitive and fair environment for AI agents across diverse activities. 

Uncompromised competition translates into value, meaning that an AI agent’s success in gaming tasks transforms it into an asset that accrues both the player’s time and money, along with the diversity and uniqueness of gaming scenarios it has encountered. 

NFT integration grants the agent autonomy, meaning that it can be traded and rented. Moreover, the agent becomes capable of possessing its own assets and making decisions independently, acting autonomously without external influence. 

The Rest of Web3 Infrastructure: Polygon and Immutable 

Alongside the Super Protocol, the Veriplay team chose Polygon and Immutable X technologies, merging these three platforms to establish a resilient Web3-compliant ecosystem for training and dynamically tokenizing AI Agents. On a high level, each solution has the following functions: 

  • Super Protocol provides the decentralized and confidential verifiable computing infrastructure necessary for widespread adoption of AI agents and dynamic NFTs in games. Leveraging TEE technology, Super ensures data and algorithms are safeguarded against

unauthorized access, manipulation, and attacks, crucial for establishing trusted and transparent web3 games. 

  • Polygon offers a fast and scalable blockchain, delivering high performance and low transaction fees. This enables efficient management of AI agents and dynamic NFTs, ensuring a seamless and cost-friendly gaming experience. Moreover, Veriplay, with its focus on a multichain future, seamlessly integrates with other EVM-compatible networks through Polygon’s multichain framework. Additionally, Polygon’s compatibility with the Ethereum Virtual Machine grants Veriplay direct access to the vast capabilities of the Ethereum ecosystem. This ensures not only smooth scaling but also opens doors to a wider range of opportunities within the Web3 space. 
  • Immutable X stands out as a premier NFT platform focused on gaming, offering scalability, low fees, and developer-friendly tools. These features simplify the integration of dynamic NFTs into games, requiring minimal cost and effort. 

Conclusion 

Super Protocol marks a new era in Web3 Games development, paving the way for innovative and immersive game worlds controlled by players and built on principles of trust and transparency. 

By enabling exclusive ownership of confidential, verifiable, and transferable AI Agents through dynamic NFTs, players can fully trust the authenticity of in-game assets. Moreover, investors in the open market can confidently invest in NFT assets backed by real AI models, sought after by players for gaming applications.

Attestation Libraries for Confidential Computing: Veraison and SPDM Tools

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Author:  Sal Kimmich

In the realm of confidential computing, ensuring trust and security in computing environments is paramount. Attestation libraries and tools provide essential components to build systems that can produce and verify evidence of trustworthiness. This blog explores the concept of attestation in confidential computing and highlights two significant projects within the Confidential Computing Consortium (CCC): Veraison and SPDM Tools.

What is Attestation in Confidential Computing?

Attestation is the process by which the hardware provides evidence about itself and the software running under its protection. Any other party can use this evidence to evaluate the trustworthiness of the Trusted Execution Environment. This process is critical in confidential computing to establish and maintain trust in computing environments, ensuring that sensitive data and operations are protected from unauthorized access and tampering.

Key Components of Attestation

  1. Evidence Generation:
    • The hardware (e.g., a device or CPU) generates evidence about its state, such as cryptographic measurements and signatures.
  2. Evidence Verification:
    • The verifier evaluates the provided evidence against a set of policies or reference values to determine the entity’s trustworthiness.
  3. Trust Anchors:
    • Cryptographic roots of trust (e.g., certificates) used to validate the identity.

Veraison: A Comprehensive Attestation Verification Service

Project Veraison builds software components to facilitate the creation of an Attestation Verification Service. Here’s how Veraison operates and its significance:

Overview

  • Purpose: Veraison aims to simplify the development of attestation verification services by providing reusable software components. These components include verification and provisioning pipelines that can be extended with plugins to support specific attestation technologies.
  • Flexibility: The project’s core components are designed to adapt to various deployment environments through abstractions, allowing for custom service creation without the need for extensive bespoke development.

Key Features

  1. Verification Pipelines:
    • Core structures for verifying attestation evidence, ensuring that it meets established trust policies.
  2. Provisioning Pipelines:
    • Components that manage the provisioning of data required for evidence appraisal, sourced from authoritative sources.
  3. Extensibility:
    • Support for plugins allows the service to handle various attestation technologies, making it versatile and adaptable to different use cases.
  4. Community and Collaboration:
    • Veraison is a collaborative project with active community involvement, including regular public meetings and contributions from multiple organizations.

Use Case: Veraison in Action

Veraison provides reference implementations to demonstrate integration principles, offering a convenient basis for developing substantive attestation verification services. These reference implementations showcase how the core components and plugins work together to create a robust verification system. 

Veraison also supports REST APIs to assist in end-to-end integration with attestation scemes, or can be used as verification components within a custom deployment. A great example of this is a key broker service, where successful attestation verification a key released to a Trusted Execution Environment. 

SPDM Tools: Enhancing Security with Attestation Protocols

SPDM (Security Protocol and Data Model) Tools offer libraries and utilities to implement the SPDM protocol, a standardized framework for secure communication and attestation between devices.

Overview

  • Purpose: SPDM Tools provide essential functionality for implementing the SPDM protocol, ensuring secure communication and attestation across various platforms.
  • Interoperability: The tools ensure interoperability between different devices and platforms, promoting a unified approach to security and attestation.

Key Features

  1. Protocol Implementation:
    • Comprehensive support for the SPDM protocol, enabling secure communication and attestation across various platforms.
  2. Utilities and Libraries:
    • A suite of tools and libraries that simplify the implementation and management of SPDM-based attestation solutions.
  3. Standardization:
    • By adhering to the SPDM standard, the tools promote consistency and reliability in attestation processes across different devices and environments.

Use Case: SPDM Tools in Secure Device Communication

SPDM Tools can establish secure communication channels between devices, ensuring that each device can verify the trustworthiness of the other before exchanging sensitive information. This capability is crucial in scenarios such as building a trusted channel between an accelerator device like a GPU and a Confidential Virtual Machine (CVM)..

SPDM-RS: A Rust Implementation for SPDM Protocols

SPDM-RS is a project within the CCC that provides a Rust language implementation of the SPDM, IDE_KM, and TDISP protocols. These protocols facilitate direct device assignment for Trusted Execution Environment I/O (TEE-I/O) in Confidential Computing.

Key Features

  1. SPDM Protocol Implementation:
    • Supports various SPDM requests and responses, including version negotiation, capability negotiation, algorithm negotiation, and more.
  2. IDE_KM and TDISP Protocols:
    • Implements protocols for secure communication and device management, enhancing the trust boundary of Confidential Virtual Machines (CVMs).
  3. Cryptographic Algorithm Support:
    • Includes support for cryptographic algorithms such as SHA-256/384/512, RSA, ECDSA, AES-GCM, and ChaCha20Poly1305.
  4. Cross-Platform Support:
    • Designed to work across different platforms, ensuring broad applicability in various confidential computing scenarios.

Conclusion

Attestation libraries and tools are vital for ensuring the trustworthiness of confidential computing environments. Projects like Veraison and SPDM Tools within the Confidential Computing Consortium provide essential components for building robust attestation solutions. By leveraging these tools, developers can create systems that securely verify and manage trust, protecting sensitive data and operations from potential threats.

End-User Devices for Confidential Computing: Exploring Islet

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Author:  Sal Kimmich

As technology evolves, the need for secure and confidential computing extends beyond servers and data centers to end-user devices such as smartphones, tablets, and personal computers. These devices are increasingly used to collect and process sensitive data, necessitating robust security measures to protect user privacy. One notable project within the Confidential Computing Consortium that addresses this need is Islet.

What is Confidential Computing?

Confidential computing is a security paradigm that aims to protect data in use by performing computation in a hardware-based Trusted Execution Environment (TEE). This approach ensures that sensitive data remains encrypted and secure even when being processed, mitigating the risk of unauthorized access and tampering.

The Importance of Trusted Firmware

Trusted Firmware is the cornerstone of Confidential Computing, providing the essential security features and isolation needed to establish a trusted execution environment. Unlike regular firmware, Trusted Firmware includes mechanisms for secure boot, cryptographic verification, and hardware-based isolation of secure and non-secure execution environments. To understand more on this topic, view our blog on Trusted Firmware. 

Islet: A Platform for On-Device Confidential Computing

Islet is an open-source project designed to enable Confidential Computing on ARM architecture devices using the ARMv9 Confidential Compute Architecture (CCA). Its primary objective is to provide a secure platform for on-device Confidential Computing, thereby protecting user privacy and enabling secure processing of sensitive data directly on end-user devices. Islet is implemented in the Rust programming language, and utilizes Rust’s inherent memory safety features to create a robust and secure environment.

Key Features of Islet

  1. Realm Management Monitor (RMM):
    • Operates at EL2 in the Realm world on the application processor cores.
    • Manages confidential virtual machines (VMs), known as realms, ensuring their secure execution.
    • Islet RMM complies with ARm’s specifications for platform ABIs, which enables Islet to integrate seamlessly with the ARM ecosystem, supporting Linux and KVM patch for ARM CCA.
  2. Hardware Enforced Security (HES):
    • Performs device boot measurement and generates platform attestation reports.
    • Manages sealing key functionality within a secure hardware IP separate from the main application processor.
  3. Automated Verification:
    • Incorporates formal verification techniques to enhance the security of Islet, ensuring robustness against various attack vectors.

Use Case: Confidential Machine Learning

Islet showcases its capabilities through a confidential machine learning demo. In this scenario, a mobile device user interacts with a chat-bot application that runs on Islet. The chat-bot processes the request and communicates with an ML server through a secure channel, demonstrating end-to-end confidential computing. This use case highlights Islet’s potential in enabling secure and private machine-to-machine computing without relying on server-side intervention.

Why End-User Devices Need Confidential Computing

While traditional confidential computing solutions focus on server-side protection, securing end-user devices is equally important for several reasons:

  1. Initial Data Collection:
    • Sensitive data collection often begins at the user device level, making it crucial to protect this data from the outset.
  2. Privacy Apps:
    • As users increasingly rely on privacy-focused applications such as secure messengers, password managers, and private browsers, ensuring the confidentiality of data on these devices becomes essential.
  3. End-to-End Security:
    • By enabling confidential computing on user devices, Islet helps establish end-to-end security throughout the entire data processing path, from collection to computation.
  4. Machine-to-Machine Computing:
    • On-device confidential computing facilitates secure machine-to-machine communication, reducing the need for server intervention and enhancing overall security.

Conclusion

Confidential computing is not just for servers and data centers; it is equally critical for end-user devices. Projects like Islet within the Confidential Computing Consortium exemplify the application of Trusted Firmware principles to secure user devices. By providing a robust platform for on-device confidential computing, Islet ensures the privacy and security of sensitive data, paving the way for more secure and private user experiences.

For more information on Islet and its capabilities, visit the Islet GitHub repository.

Understanding Trusted Firmware in Confidential Computing: Coconut SVSM and VirTEE 

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Author:  Sal Kimmich

Trusted Firmware serves as the foundational layer in confidential computing, ensuring that the hardware and software environment’s security and integrity are maintained. Unlike regular firmware, Trusted Firmware is designed with additional security features and responsibilities to establish a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE). Here’s a deeper dive into what makes Trusted Firmware different and its role in confidential computing.

 

Differences Between Trusted Firmware and Regular Firmware

  1. Enhanced Security Features:
    • Regular Firmware: Primarily focuses on initializing hardware components and providing basic services to the operating system.
    • Trusted Firmware: Includes enhanced security features such as cryptographic verification of firmware components, secure boot, and mechanisms to enforce hardware-based isolation of secure and non-secure execution environments.
  2. Isolation and Trust:
    • Regular Firmware: Does not inherently provide mechanisms to isolate critical operations or sensitive data from the rest of the system.
    • Trusted Firmware: Establishes a TEE, isolating sensitive operations from the general-purpose operating system and protecting them from potential threats and unauthorized access.
  3. Responsibility and Scope:
    • Regular Firmware: Manages standard hardware initialization and operational tasks.
    • Trusted Firmware: Manages secure initialization of hardware features, authenticates and validates software components, and provides a secure execution environment for critical tasks.

Why Trusted Firmware is Necessary

Trusted Firmware is crucial for confidential computing because it provides a secure foundation that prevents unauthorized access and tampering. Here’s why Trusted Firmware is needed and how it differs from the regular OS and firmware:

Need for Trusted OS:

  • Purpose: To prevent resources from being accessed directly by the generalist OS running concurrently with it, such as preventing a user with root privileges from accessing sensitive resources.
  • Security: The Trusted OS operates with higher privileges and tighter security controls, ensuring that critical operations and data are protected even if the general OS is compromised.

Differences from Normal OS:

  • Size and Scope: The Trusted OS is designed to be small and secure, running with higher privileges than the general OS. For instance, in an ARMv8-a system, parts of the Trusted OS run at EL3 (highest privilege), while a hypervisor runs at EL2, and Linux at EL1.
  • Purpose: The Trusted OS is not meant to replace the general OS like Linux, which is extensive and feature-rich. Instead, it secures specific resources and operations from the general OS.

Security Provided by Trusted OS:

  • Threat Protection: It protects against attempts by users of the general OS to access resources managed by the Trusted OS, including both legitimate and illegitimate access attempts.
  • Mechanism: It uses secure mechanisms, such as the SMC instruction, to switch between the general OS and the Trusted OS when necessary to access secure resources.

Switching Between Trusted OS and Normal World:

  • Context Switching: Occurs when code running in the general OS needs to access a resource managed by the Trusted OS, such as decrypting content using a key only accessible by the Trusted OS.
  • Interrupt Handling: Hardware interrupts may also trigger a switch to the Trusted OS, allowing safe handling of interrupts within the TEE context.

Example Projects

COCONUT Secure VM Service Module (SVSM)

The COCONUT Secure VM Service Module (SVSM) exemplifies Trusted Firmware in confidential computing by providing secure services and device emulations for Confidential Virtual Machines (CVMs). Key features include:

  • Integration with AMD SEV-SNP: Utilizes AMD’s Secure Encrypted Virtualization with Secure Nested Paging, including the VM Privilege Level feature, to ensure robust hardware-based security.
  • Secure Boot and Authentication: Ensures a secure boot process and component authentication, maintaining a trusted execution path from the firmware to the CVM.

VirTEE

VirTEE is another project that demonstrates the application of Trusted Firmware principles. It focuses on:

  • Open Community Development: Collaborative development of tools for TEE bring-up, attestation, and management, supporting a wide range of virtualization platforms.
  • Support for Multiple Technologies: Includes tools and libraries for AMD SEV, SEV-SNP, and Intel TDX, providing comprehensive support for secure virtualization across different hardware platforms.

Discover more about VirTEE via their project repository. 

Conclusion

Trusted Firmware is essential for establishing and maintaining secure and reliable confidential computing environments. It provides enhanced security features, isolation, and trust mechanisms that are not present in regular firmware. Projects like COCONUT-SVSM and VirTEE illustrate the practical application of Trusted Firmware principles, showcasing robust frameworks for secure virtualized environments and cross-platform confidential computing. These projects ensure the integrity and confidentiality of sensitive data and operations, advancing the field of secure computing.

 

 

Catch the Exclusive Interview with Mike Bursell at the Confidential Computing Summit 2024

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The Confidential Computing Summit 2024, the premier event for confidential data and AI, triumphantly returned to San Francisco this summer on June 5-6. With a larger and more comprehensive two-day conference, this year’s event brought together the brightest minds in confidential computing and privacy-preserving AI to explore emerging technologies and innovative solutions.

Did you miss the Summit? We’ve Got You Covered!

If you missed this year’s conference, don’t worry,  you can still catch the sessions including an exclusive interview with Mike Bursell, Executive Director at the Confidential Computing Consortium. Mike’s insights offer an in-depth look at the latest developments and future directions in confidential computing and privacy-preserving AI.

Learn from the Best

Hear from  industry leaders, innovators, and researchers as they delve into the cutting-edge technologies shaping the future of confidential data and analytics. Gain valuable knowledge from experts on how confidential computing is revolutionizing data security and AI applications, offering new privacy and data protection solutions.

  • Mike Bursell’s Interview: Discover his perspective on the critical role of confidential computing in safeguarding sensitive data and the future of privacy-preserving AI.
  • Conference Sessions: Explore other engaging sessions and panel discussions from the Summit to stay ahead of the curve in confidential computing technologies.

Why You Should Tune In

  • Exclusive Insights: Gain access to thought leadership from key figures in the industry.
  • Emerging Technologies: Get a front-row seat to the latest advancements and trends in confidential data and AI.
  • Networking Opportunities: Connect with fellow professionals and experts in the field.

Confidential Computing Consortium Resources

Hushmesh: Building a Secure Future with Confidential Computing

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Author: Manu Fontaine

At Hushmesh, a U.S.-based Public Benefit cybersecurity startup, we see Confidential Computing as a foundational technology for all things digital, paving the way for an inherently secure and private Internet. Imagine a future where Confidential Computing underpins a “universal zero trust” model at the chip level, whereby privacy and security are built into our digital infrastructure instead of bolted on.

Traditionally, data security and privacy are bolted on after the fact with a patchwork of point-solutions on top of an insecure infrastructure. However, with Confidential Computing, these critical  elements can become inherent to the infrastructure, automated  directly at the chip level without human intervention.

Our vision at Hushmesh is to utilize Confidential Computing to build the Mesh, a global information space and infrastructure, like the Web, but with automated end-to-end cryptographic security and privacy built in for everything and everyone. As Hushmesh CEO Manu Fontaine puts it, “Confidential Computing is the necessary technology to deliver digital peace of mind at internet scale. The Mesh is the definitive solution to identity theft, data breaches, fakes, and fraud.”

The potential of Confidential Computing extends beyond what is currently imaginable. By embedding security into the very fabric of our digital infrastructure, we aim to eliminate the vulnerabilities that threaten our digital lives, and to move towards a future where trust is inherent, not an afterthought. The need for this transformation is urgent, and we must act now to secure our digital future.

Confidential Computing is not just a technological advancement but a paradigm shift. It challenges us to rethink how we approach security and privacy for the next phase of the digital age, pushing us towards an inherently secure and trustworthy Internet for everyone. At Hushmesh, we are excited to be at the forefront of this revolution, working towards a future where Confidential Computing is ubiquitous. Without Confidential Computing, universal zero trust is simply not possible.

Join us on this journey to redefine digital security and privacy with Confidential Computing. Together, we can shape a future where our digital lives are secure and private, where trust is inherent, not an afterthought. Your participation is crucial in this collective effort to make the Internet what we all need it to be.

Read The Case for Confidential report here.

Manu Fontaine is the Founder and CEO of Hushmesh, the public benefit corporation developing and operating the Mesh. You can think of the Mesh as a global information space, like the Web, but with universal zero trust built in. Secured by the Universal Name System (UNS) and Universal Certificate Authority (UCA), the Mesh delivers what the Web never could: the global assurance of provenance, integrity, authenticity, reputation, confidentiality, and privacy for all bits within it, be they code or data, at internet scale. The Mesh is the definitive solution to identity theft, data breaches, fakes, and fraud. Hushmesh is developing privacy-preserving wallet and verifier Mesh agents for DHS SVIP, alongside secure “meshaging” for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (NATO DIANA) Secure Information Sharing Challenge. www.hushmesh.com

Confidential Computing Consortium Enhances PETs Integration at Asia Pacific PET Summit

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Authored by Mike Bursell

On Tuesday, July 16th, the Confidential Computing Consortium proudly served as the Associate Sponsor for the third PET Summit in the Asia Pacific region, held once again in Singapore. This year’s event occurred at the Marina Bay Sands Expo & Convention Centre, perfectly timed to coincide with Singapore’s PDP (Privacy Data Protection) week. The IMDA, Singapore’s leading organization for promoting digital innovation in business and society, supported it.

The summit saw a fantastic turnout. With over 400 registrations, the main hall was buzzing with activity, and the breakout hall next door was equally busy, hosting lively discussions among customers, ISVs, government representatives, and academic researchers. Your active participation and engagement were key to the success of the event.

IMDA’s Chief Executive, Chuen Hong LEW, kicked off the event, followed by an introduction from Mike Bursell, the CCC’s Executive Director. This year, the summit shifted the focus from simply educating about Privacy-Enhancing Technologies (PETs) to exploring their implementation, real-world use cases, and evangelization. A key highlight recognized the diverse range of PETs as an opportunity to match solutions to business needs, allowing organizations to choose the best-suited technologies rather than being limited to a single approach.

This addition is a significant win for Confidential Computing, which can integrate seamlessly with various PETs, enhancing privacy and transparency. This was highlighted in a panel discussion moderated by Mike Bursell titled “How Privacy-Enhancing Technologies (PETs) & Confidential Computing Balance Privacy & Transparency.” Panelists included Jesse Schrater (Intel), Zheng Leong (Automata Network), Anubhav Nayyar (Silence Laboratories), and Mark Bundgaard (Partisia). Following this, Mike introduced Confidential Computing and its potential, especially in multi-party and collaborative computing use cases.  Another session, also moderated by Mike, emphasized the need for PET evangelization at the organizational level, advocating for solutions that address specific business needs rather than adopting a “technology looking for a problem” approach.

The summit also highlighted the growing interest in Confidential Computing across the Asia Pacific region. Attendees included representatives from global organizations with a regional presence, local companies, and regional and national business organizations. A common theme in the moderated roundtable session was the importance of collaborating with regulators and standards bodies to promote accepted norms for deployments. The CCC actively encourages and coordinates this effort through its GRC (Governance, Risk, and Compliance) Special Interest Group.

For more information about the GRC Special Interest Group or other parts of the CCC, please visit here.

The Challenges and Rewards of Confidential Computing

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Discover how Confidential Computing can revolutionize data security, compliance, and innovation by reading The Case for Confidential Computing by Suzanne Ambiel. This report offers valuable insights for business leaders looking to leverage this emerging technology to secure data in use and unlock new opportunities.

Who should read this report?

The target audience includes business leaders, IT professionals, and decision-makers across various industries. Specifically, it is aimed at CIOs, CTOs, CISOs, and data protection officers who are responsible for safeguarding sensitive data and ensuring compliance with data privacy regulations.

Anyone else?

Additionally, the report is relevant to healthcare providers, financial institutions, and marketing strategists seeking innovative solutions to securely process and collaborate on data. It also addresses technology vendors, cloud service providers, and enterprise architects interested in the latest advancements in secure data processing and trusted execution environments.

DOWNLOAD THE REPORT

Why is Confidential Computing important?

The protection and confidential processing of data are crucial for maintaining competitive advantage, regulatory compliance, and customer trust. The report offers comprehensive insights into how businesses across various industries can leverage Confidential Computing to secure data in use. This technology not only enhances data privacy and security but also unlocks new opportunities for cloud computing, multiparty data collaboration, and innovation. With the insights achieved from this report, business leaders will gain a clear understanding of how Confidential Computing can address the pressing challenges of data security, especially in the context of AI, cloud computing, and multiparty data collaboration.

Transformative benefits shown through real world examples

The report dives deep into industry-specific use cases, illustrating how Confidential Computing can transform operations in sectors like healthcare, financial services, and marketing. For instance, it explains how Confidential Computing enables secure data aggregation in healthcare, leading to better patient outcomes and more efficient research processes.

By exploring these use cases, readers will see how implementing Confidential Computing can lead to significant business benefits, including enhanced data security, compliance with global regulations, and improved operational efficiency. The report is a valuable resource for any organization looking to harness the full potential of its data while safeguarding it against modern cyber threats.

A surprising reward

One of the most surprising findings from the report relates to how financial institutions are leveraging Confidential Computing to combat money laundering. By securely pooling transaction data from multiple institutions in a Confidential Computing environment, these organizations can detect suspicious activities more effectively and comply with stringent anti-money laundering regulations. This collaboration not only enhances fraud detection and reduces compliance costs but also accelerates innovation in financial crime prevention, illustrating the transformative potential of Confidential Computing in the financial sector.

Go deeper with practical next steps

The report offers detailed insights into how Confidential Computing can enable secure multiparty data collaboration, which is crucial for industries like healthcare and financial services that deal with highly sensitive data. By understanding these mechanisms, organizations can better protect their data while leveraging collaborative opportunities. It provides actionable recommendations for improving data security practices, including the implementation of trusted execution environments (TEEs) and secure enclaves. These practical steps can help organizations enhance their overall cybersecurity posture and ensure compliance with global data protection regulations. The report includes industry-specific use cases that demonstrate the tangible benefits of Confidential Computing in various sectors. Readers can learn how leading organizations are successfully using this technology to innovate, improve operational efficiency, and gain a competitive edge while maintaining stringent security standards.

Take it from the experts

The primary research for “The Case for Confidential Computing” involved comprehensive interviews with key industry experts from leading organizations such as TikTok, Google, Hushmesh, Intel, Decentriq, RedHat, and the Confidential Computing Consortium. Participants included Vini Jaiswal, Mingshen Sun, and Dayeol Lee from TikTok; Manu Fontaine from Hushmesh; Marcus Hartwig from Google; Malini Bhandaru, Mike Ferron-Jones, Mona Vij, and Paul O’Neill from Intel; Nikolas Molyndris and Andrew Knox from Decentriq; and Mike Bursell from the Confidential Computing Consortium. These experts provided insights into the practical applications, benefits, and challenges of Confidential Computing across various sectors, highlighting the technology’s potential to enhance data security, facilitate compliance, and drive innovation.

Revolutionizing Data Security with Confidential Computing

Confidential Computing offers transformative benefits across multiple sectors by providing a secure, hardware-based environment that protects data in use. This technology enables efficient marketing by enriching first-party data, supports the adoption of AI by safeguarding proprietary models, and enhances financial security through secure data pooling. It also fosters collaboration in healthcare, allowing for better patient outcomes and accelerated medical research This approach could revolutionize data security, making it an inherent feature of the infrastructure, thus automating and securing the entire digital ecosystem.

Learn more about these important concepts and how your business can benefit by diving in to The Case for Confidential Computing by Suzanne Ambiel.