Cryptographic splitting, also known as cryptographic bit splitting or cryptographic data splitting, is a technique for securing data over a computer network. The technique involves encrypting data, splitting the encrypted data into smaller data units, distributing those smaller units to different storage locations, and then further encrypting the data at its new location.
With this process, the data is protected from security breaches, because even if an intruder is able to retrieve and decrypt one data unit, the information would be useless unless it can be combined with decrypted data units from the other locations.
History
The technology was filed for patent consideration in June 2003, and the patent was granted in June 2008.
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Technology
Cryptographic splitting utilizes a combination of different algorithms to provide the data protection. A block of data is first encrypted using the AES-256 government encryption standard. The encrypted bits are then split into different shares and then each share is hashed using the National Security Agency
The National Security Agency (NSA) is a national-level intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collect ...
's SHA-256
SHA-2 (Secure Hash Algorithm 2) is a set of cryptographic hash functions designed by the United States National Security Agency (NSA) and first published in 2001. They are built using the Merkle–Damgård construction, from a one-way compressi ...
algorithm.
Applications
One application of cryptographic splitting is to provide security for cloud computing
Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage ( cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mu ...
. The encrypted data subsets can be stored on different clouds, with the information required to restore the data being held on a private cloud
Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage ( cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mul ...
for additional security. Security vendor Security First Corp uses this technology for its Secure Parser Extended (SPx) product line.
In 2009, technology services company Unisys
Unisys Corporation is an American multinational information technology (IT) services and consulting company headquartered in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. It provides digital workplace solutions, cloud, applications, and infrastructure solutions, ...
gave a presentation about using cryptographic splitting with storage area networks. By splitting the data into different parts of the storage area network, this technique provided data redundancy in addition to security.[
Computer giant IBM has written about using the technology as part of its Cloud Data Encryption Services (ICDES).
The technology has also been written about in the context of more effectively using sensitive corporate information, by entrusting different individuals within a company (trustees) with different parts of the information.]
See also
* Secret sharing
Secret sharing (also called secret splitting) refers to methods for distributing a secret among a group, in such a way that no individual holds any intelligible information about the secret, but when a sufficient number of individuals combine t ...
References
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Information governance
Data security