Multi-Party Computation (MPC) is transforming how organizations manage sensitive data. By allowing companies to safely merge and analyze otherwise inaccessible datasets, whether due to strict privacy regulations or a need for confidentiality, MPC opens the door to new insights that were previously off-limits.
To find out more, we spoke with Anders Peter Kragh, Senior Cryptographic Engineer at Partisia, to get his insights on Multi-Party Computation and its future direction.
1. Why has Multi-Party Computation gained more attention over the last 10 years?
Anders: There are two main reasons.
First, advances in cryptographic algorithms have made MPC far more practical.
Second, the move toward digitization, such as hospitals shifting from paper to electronic records, has made it possible to run complex computations on large digital datasets. When data was just stored on paper in a doctor's office archive, MPC wasn't very useful.
2. Which core problems does MPC solve?
Anders: It addresses two significant challenges: Regulatory compliance and confidentiality.
From a regulatory perspective, MPC helps organizations comply with privacy laws like GDPR by keeping sensitive data secure while still enabling analysis.
On the confidentiality side, businesses have information they want to protect, like trade secrets, pricing or other sensitive data. With MPC, multiple parties, or businesses, can collaborate and analyze shared data without revealing the underlying data input to each other.
3. Where do you see MPC being implemented over the next few years?
Anders: I expect to see it in large institutions with vast, persistent datasets, such as hospitals and banks.
These organizations will use MPC to collaborate with partners or researchers, all while keeping private data safe and staying GDPR compliant.
4. Partisia combines MPC with Blockchain. Why is that combination so powerful?
Anders: Well, MPC protects the data during calculations, but you still need a mechanism to coordinate and confirm that all parties consent to run the calculation.
This is exactly what Blockchain does by providing a shared ledger to ensure that everyone consents before those calculations take place. So, MPC delivers privacy, and blockchain offers transparency and coordination – a perfect match.
5. If an organization wants to get started with MPC, where do they begin?
Anders: Organizations should begin by asking themselves three fundamental questions:
1. Do multiple parties need to analyze each other’s data?
2. Must that data remain confidential?
3. Do you want to avoid relying on a third party?
If the answer is "yes" to these questions, it’s time to explore MPC further.
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