If you like your privacy, you'll like what the latest encryption technology will do for you. With interest in Internet encryption rising, a number of vendors are jumping into the encryption chip market, which Dataquest projects will surge to $750 million by 2004. The competition is producing a wave of innovation that is driving down costs.
Last year, the majority of Internet encryption chips (those that accelerate Internet standards, such as IPsec and SSL) came from a single company, Hifn. By next year, at least 10 vendors will be selling such chips.
Last year, the few vendors in the market focused on LAN and access equipment, offering chips with system through-put of up to 80 Mbits/second. But earlier this year, Broadcom pushed the speed to 300 Mbits/s, and that company is now sampling a 2.5-Gbit/s device.
By the middle of next year, both Broadcom and startup Corrent will be producing 10-Gbit/s chips. Hifn and others will not be far behind in performance.
As a result, over a span of less than two years, the market will have seen a stunning leap of more than 100x in encryption speed. For devotees of Moore's Law, that's 10 years of progress compressed into several months. What happened?
The previous generation of encryption chips was designed for cost, not performance. Projects were typically done quickly, by a few designers. With a small market, there wasn't enough return on investment to justify more effort.
As the market blooms, vendors are putting more resources into designing the chips, pulling in cryptographic experts from dark corners of the world. Vendors are seeking higher performance to differentiate themselves and to support more lucrative price points.
The current flurry of designs ensures that encryption chips will be able to keep pace with the fastest optical connections available. Even at the highest speeds, they will cost only a few hundred dollars.
Using a massive array of older chips, a 2.5-Gbit/s virtual private network system today can cost more than $300,000. Using next-generation technology, the same performance will probably sell for less than $15,000.
The dramatic cost reduction will enable widespread deployment of encryption systems, allowing users to encrypt their Internet transactions for as little as $1 per month. That's a small price to pay for privacy.
Linley Gwennap, founder of the Linley Group, is author of the recently completed report "A Guide to Security Processors" (www.linleygroup.com/npu).
RSS
RSS| 
Digital| 
Mobile
