MPC-based post-quantum zero knowledge proof systems with fast verification

To this present day, obtaining trust has required people to reveal private information. Think of sharing one’s date of birth to prove one is over 18 or sharing one’s financial records to prove that one is debt-free. For businesses that rely on private proprietary software, proving that they adhere to security and privacy regulations requires auditing by independent experts. The only way to protect the business’s property is then to legally bound auditors to silence with the risk that the knowledge might still be revealed one day. But what if this trust could be provided without the risks of giving up privacy?

Zero-knowledge proof systems are a cryptographic tool that provide just this: both trust and privacy. Invented in the 1980s, proof systems have served only within bigger cryptographic protocols, and never as applications of their own until very recently (e.g., in blockchains). To provide transformative services within our digital societies, these must be scaled up and optimized to work with much larger programs.

This project will use the modern technology of multiparty computation, optimised for large programs, to construct such proof systems. To addition to their scale, these systems will be provably post-quantum secure, to guarantee a life-time of security. Furthermore, they will focus on concrete efficiency and fast verification.