An examination of global trends in the use of cryptography

 

 

Protecting data, assets, and transactions is essential at all times, but it's especially important now with growing innovation, customer demand, and the need to negotiate a complicated regulatory framework. Not to mention, it's also important to keep ahead of developing cyber threats. As a result, to assist in safeguarding daily operations, enterprises of all sizes and in every nation throughout the world need to employ cryptographic solutions. Encrypting data and applications, managing encryption keys, verifying identities, and providing message integrity are all included in this.

Cryptography works in the background to protect sensitive data and guarantee payments are secure, benefiting everyone from the biggest global banks and payment processors that process hundreds of transactions every second to the newest micro merchants that are just starting to accept payments. Organizations use either hardware or cloud solutions (or a combination of both) whenever and whenever cryptography is in use to make sure data and transactions are secure and compliant.

spanning sectors and nations, common cryptographic motifs include:

1. Payment processing is leading the way in adopting the cloud across all industries.

2. More compact FinTech companies are innovating greatly.

3. Businesses frequently look for assistance to comply with requirements, particularly regarding data localization.

Since publishing Cryptographic Management Trends Around the World, I've spoken with Futurex team members from our offices around the world, including Ruchin Kumar, vice president, South Asia; Mark Howland, senior business development, EMEA; and Santos Campa, vice president, LAC, for more cryptographic insights and perspectives. We also drilled down on cryptographic use cases to see what's similar and what's different across regions. Each region—South Asia, EMEA, and LAC—will be examined separately.

South Asia: A Successful Payment Ecosystem

Ruchin Kumar noted that the financial services sector in South Asia, notably India, are the biggest users of hardware security modules (HSMs) and cryptography in the entire area. In South Asia, HSMs are crucial for maintaining the security of private keys, managing PKIs, and controlling digital signature for message integrity and non-repudiation. They also secure the foundation of trust. In fact, he claimed, India accounts for over 95% of all South Asian HSM use cases.

The standards and laws necessary for payments and financial services work hand in hand with payment systems and payment security. The Information Technology Act of India, 2000 and its revisions of 2008, 2011, and 2016, as well as rules established by Unique Identification of India (UIDAI), National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), and Payments Council of India (PCI), are among these.

According to Kumar, businesses utilise general-purpose HSMs for digital signatures for non-repudiation and message integrity, and payment HSMs are used for acquiring, switching, issuing cards, issuing green PINs, and other security requirements for payment applications (these types of HSMs are required by regulations). What is coming up? According to Kumar, enterprises are testing and evaluating the use of cryptography extensively for their infrastructure, and many are looking into tokenization for security and agility, particularly with the emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchain, and AI. Furthermore, remote key loading is becoming increasingly popular since modern field equipment like ATMs, point-of-sale systems, and mobile computers all need to exchange keys with centralized servers.

Asian business enterprises See Local Data Centers as Essential for Data Residency and Localization and Cryptography as a Service.

Local Data Centers are Important for Data Residency and Localization (see Cryptography-as-a-Service and Local Data Centers)

Most South Asian businesses have embraced the cloud on a big scale over the last two years, embracing it as a resource to host their vital applications. Organizations' desire to maintain ownership and control of their encryption keys has played a major part in this cloud migration's security. Because of this, many businesses now rely on Futurex's VirtuCrypt cloud HSM and key management solution for security and regulatory compliance.