Operations technology specialist Honeywell will incorporate quantum computing enhanced encryption keys into its smart, gas and water meters through a partnership with industry specialist Quantinuum, which Honeywell says will provide consumers with enhanced protection against future cyber threats.

The deal makes Honeywell the first company to deploy quantum encryption in this way, and the organization hopes it will “set a new benchmark” for protecting critical utilities and their customers from cyber incidents and ensuring that the underlying infrastructure can function without them.

The collaboration centers on Quantum Origin technology, which Quantinuum co-developed with Honeywell and will launch in 2021, which its developers claim is the world’s first commercial product built using a quantum computer, “delivering results that classical computers cannot achieve.”

The core of Quantum Origin technology lies in its quantum-computation-enhanced randomness, which can generate truly unpredictable keys that help protect the most valuable data and assets from advanced cyberattacks, with clear advantages over traditional methods:

1. Stay ahead of current and future threats

Quantum Origin generates encryption keys with unprecedented strength for durable defense against emerging cyber risks

2. Easy integration with existing infrastructure

Quantum Origin is designed to work seamlessly with current systems to extend the life of your IT investments

3. Prepare for post-quantum standards

Quantum Origin supports new post-quantum algorithms standardized by NIST and traditional algorithms (such as RSA or AES)

4. Verifiable source of encryption strength

Quantum Origin’s advanced approach generates strong, verified encryption keys, eliminating one source of vulnerability

Quantinuum is a cloud-hosted cryptographic key generation platform that uses the output of quantum computers to derive keys to ensure that data is protected from current and future cyberattacks at a basic level. This is considered an advantage over more traditional services because the technology makes the keys unpredictable.

“By integrating Quantinuum’s quantum computing enhanced encryption technology into our smart meters, we are advancing data security for our customers and starting a conversation about how the utility industry should approach cybersecurity in the quantum age,” said Hamed Heyhat, president of Smart Meters. Honeywell’s Energy and thermal solutions.

“This integration underscores the need for continued innovation to stay ahead of the evolving threat landscape,” he said. “This level of protection is essential in our increasingly digital and connected world.”

Tony Uttley, Quantinuum’s President and Chief operating officer, added, “Strong cybersecurity requires a multifaceted approach that utilizes the latest technologies. Our collaboration with Honeywell demonstrates the importance of harnessing the power of today’s quantum computers to create a more resilient network infrastructure to better protect customers.”

How to properly deal with the threat posed by quantum computing to existing cybersecurity measures continues to plague the industry.

However, as the pace of innovation accelerates, it is already abundantly clear that organizations operating in industries that are more likely to be attacked or where an attack would cause significant disruption or even threaten lives, such as utilities that form a core element of a nation’s critical national infrastructure, should already be thinking about the potential impact.

Quantum-enhanced smart meter products are now available in Europe and North America.

Cambridge-based Quantinuum was formed in 2021 from the merger of previous organization Cambridge Quantum and Honeywell’s own Honeywell Quantum Solutions with a mission to use quantum computing to positively change the world, In addition to cybersecurity, it is committed to applying emerging technologies to pharmaceutical research, healthcare innovation, materials science, the energy transition, and climate collapse.

Its technology regularly breaks quantum volume records (a metric developed by IBM to measure the power and error rate of a quantum system), most recently reaching a volume of 524,288 (219) in July 2023. Its operating system is largely open source, although it does include some proprietary code, and it publishes its performance data to its GitHub repository.