Raising awareness of quantum impacts in cybersecurity

CQT showcased to the cybersecurity industry the technology and training the Centre can offer

The Centre for Quantum Technologies brought experts and devices to this year's GovWare, a conference and exhibition organised as part of Singapore International Cyber Week. The event, held 19 to 21 September, is aimed at "technology leaders, industry professionals, policy-makers and innovators".

Delegates at GovWare came from both business and government. Thanks to the Centre's presence at the exhibition, these cybersecurity professionals and government end-users had the opportunity to learn about the risks and opportunities of the quantum era.

"GovWare was the right platform to share the relevance of CQT research to the cybersecurity industry. We communicated the point about quantum computing posing threats to RSA and cybersecurity and shared about quantum-safe solutions, which were not widely known even among industry professionals. Hopefully this awareness will help the community better prepare for advances in quantum technologies," says Lum Chune Yang, Head of Strategic Development for CQT's industry relations team.

Representatives from some 60 different organisations talked to our staff at the event or stopped by the Centre's booth. The CQT industry team's objectives are to inform, engage and create with external parties. While exhibiting contributes to informing industry about quantum technologies, the Centre offers training and consulting for organisations looking for deeper learning. There are also possibilities for research collaborations.

One of the displays at CQT's GovWare booth highlighted the Centre's collaboration with Singtel, Asia's leading communications group. CQT is working with Singtel in the NUS-Singtel Cyber Security R&D Lab to develop quantum communication technology for Singapore's fibre networks. We showcased a device built in-house that will measure how quantum signals are affected by the environment as they travel through fibre.

Other devices on display included:

• A compact source of entangled photon-pairs, with output coupled to fibers. Such photons can be used for key distribution and timing synchronization
• A satellite designed to test technology for quantum key distribution over cross-continental distances
• A fast quantum random number generator
• An ion trap, ion-trap chip and superconducting circuit which could contain quantum bits (qubits) for quantum computing

Find out more about how the Centre works with industry at this page.