DigiCert has announced the launch of DigiCert Labs, an initiative dedicated to researching and developing innovative approaches to security challenges, in collaboration with leading university researchers and industry leaders.
“DigiCert Labs is focused on working with the brightest minds to bring to market innovative approaches for our customers, partners and prospects,” said DigiCert CTO Dan Timpson. “In collaboration with leading researchers and industry leaders, we plan to gain data-based insights into solving some of the most pressing security challenges related to our core competencies of encryption, authentication, identity and data integrity.”
DigiCert Labs will take two approaches to advancing technology innovation in collaboration with leading researchers. One is providing grants to universities to support research into specific challenges related to emerging threats and also through collaboration with other enterprise labs. Guidance will come from DigiCert’s review of academic and industry research as well as feedback from customers. The second approach involves providing large, anonymized datasets to help researchers address real-world use cases.
“DigiCert Labs will tackle the biggest challenges of DigiCert customers and the industry at large to drive innovation that will benefit companies today, and well into the future,” said Avesta Hojjati, head of DigiCert Labs. “As part of this work, we will contribute industry-specific expertise and resources to ensure advancements in cyber security technologies and practical solutions to common problems.”
DigiCert Labs’ first two research projects involve postquantum cryptography—working with Microsoft Research, Utimaco, ISARA and Gemalto—and machine learning—in collaboration with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. DigiCert welcomes additional collaborators and will assess the relevance of each opportunity.
“The researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign work on challenging problems related to machine learning, security and privacy, and blockchain,” said Hojjati. “DigiCert is supporting the researchers to advance tomorrow’s security solutions.”
