Mitsubishi Electric Develops Searchable Encryption Platform Software

Mitsubishi
Electric Corporation has developed Japan’s first
searchable encryption platform software that supports both data
encryption and access control for users who perform keyword searches
in the cloud.

The software will enhance
the security of cloud services where information normally is uploaded
in encrypted code but retrieved without decrypting. The software will
be presented at the DICOMO 2013
Symposium, which will take place at the Hotel Daiheigen in
Hokkaido, Japan from July 10-12.

Features

1/ Encryption technology
for storage in
cloud services

The platform software incorporates the
company’s searchable encryption algorithm, which supports access
control functionality, such as group-based document sharing. The
encryption algorithm enables documents to be encrypted so that only
the users of designated groups (departments, divisions, etc.) can
perform keyword searches.

2/ Large data searches in 1-3s, or less

The index generation software for
searchable encryption allows authorized users to issue a ticket,
which is then used by the cloud service provider to generate an index
from the encrypted data for accelerated searches. Each one-bit index
accelerates the search by a factor of approximately two. The company
also has implemented an automatic parallelization system in the
platform. As a result, searches require no more than 1-3s for 100,000
pieces of data, which is several hundred times faster than the
prototype system utilized for research.

3/ No dedicated application
required in
client PCs

Encryption and key management programs
are implemented as an ActiveX plug-in module, so users on the client
side are not required to install dedicated application software in
their PCs. Instead, they access the cloud services via Internet
Explorer. Also, the platform can be used with commercial DBMS
software, and SQL languages can be used to access the platform.

Patents
Pending patents for the technology
total three in Japan and two overseas.