International Association for Cryptologic Research

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Security Guidelines for Implementing Homomorphic Encryption

Authors:
Jean-Philippe Bossuat , Independent
Rosario Cammarota , Intel Labs
Ilaria Chillotti
Benjamin R. Curtis , Zama
Wei Dai , TikTok Inc.
Huijing Gong , Intel Labs
Erin Hales , Royal Holloway, University of London
Duhyeong Kim , Intel Labs
Bryan Kumara , The Alan Turing Institute
Changmin Lee , Korea Institute for Advanced Study
Xianhui Lu , Chinese Academy of Sciences
Carsten Maple , The Alan Turing Institute, University of Warwick
Alberto Pedrouzo-Ulloa , atlanTTic, Universidade de Vigo
Rachel Player , Royal Holloway, University of London
Yuriy Polyakov , Duality Technologies
Luis Antonio Ruiz Lopez , Lorica Cybersecurity
Yongsoo Song , Seoul National University
Donggeon Yhee
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DOI: 10.62056/anxra69p1
URL: https://cic.iacr.org/p/1/4/26
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Abstract:

Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) is a cryptographic primitive that allows performing arbitrary operations on encrypted data. Since the conception of the idea in [RAD78], it has been considered a holy grail of cryptography. After the first construction in 2009 [Gen09], it has evolved to become a practical primitive with strong security guarantees. Most modern constructions are based on well-known lattice problems such as Learning With Errors (LWE). Besides its academic appeal, in recent years FHE has also attracted significant attention from industry, thanks to its applicability to a considerable number of real-world use-cases. An upcoming standardization effort by ISO/IEC aims to support the wider adoption of these techniques. However, one of the main challenges that standards bodies, developers, and end users usually encounter is establishing parameters. This is particularly hard in the case of FHE because the parameters are not only related to the security level of the system, but also to the type of operations that the system is able to handle. In this paper we provide examples of parameter sets for LWE targeting particular security levels, that can be used in the context of FHE constructions. We also give examples of complete FHE parameter sets, including the parameters relevant for correctness and performance, alongside those relevant for security. As an additional contribution, we survey the parameter selection support offered in open-source FHE libraries.

BibTeX
@article{cic-2025-34919,
  title={Security Guidelines for Implementing Homomorphic Encryption},
  journal={cic},
  publisher={International Association for Cryptologic Research},
  volume={1, Issue 4},
  url={https://cic.iacr.org/p/1/4/26},
  doi={10.62056/anxra69p1},
  author={Jean-Philippe Bossuat and Rosario Cammarota and Ilaria Chillotti and Benjamin R. Curtis and Wei Dai and Huijing Gong and Erin Hales and Duhyeong Kim and Bryan Kumara and Changmin Lee and Xianhui Lu and Carsten Maple and Alberto Pedrouzo-Ulloa and Rachel Player and Yuriy Polyakov and Luis Antonio Ruiz Lopez and Yongsoo Song and Donggeon Yhee},
  year=2025
}