Managing who has the ability to enter and interact with company IT systems and data can be complex, and the task is likely to become increasingly more so in the years to come. Fractal security measures, like fractal encryption and digital signatures, might be able to offer the protection and access control businesses need as the computing systems used by hackers and cyber criminals grow more advanced and capable.
Business Applications for Fractals: Fractal Security
There are multiple practical and philosophical business applications for fractals, both currently in use and still in the research and development stages. Using fractals for cyber security is one example. Cryptography and access control models that use fractals or fractal algorithms, images, and principles are already in use. These models have also been proposed as potential solutions for impending cryptography weaknesses as quantum computing becomes a reality.
Fractal Fundamentals
Fractals, basically, have always existed, but mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot gave the phenomena a name in 1975. Since then, data scientists, biologists, mathematicians, and others have studied the various applications for fractals and fractal concepts, including using fractals for cyber security.
A fractal is a rough geometric form with self-similarity that replicates its basic pattern on an apparently infinite scale. These underlying, repeated patterns create a seemingly chaotic form that actually follows a logical order. Fractals have infinite dimension that exists within a finite space. Trees, rivers, clouds, mountains, and many other natural objects are fractals. These characteristics lend to some interesting IT business applications for fractals, among them fractal encryption and access control models.
Access Control Models for Business IT Security
Access control—managing who can access company systems and data—has grown more complicated with the rise of remote work, bring your own device (BYOD) policies, and continual advancements in cyber hacking techniques among other factors.
Various access control models attempt to solve the problems companies are faced with in regard to access and data protection. Generally, these models involve two stages: authentication and authorization. Authentication confirms who is trying to access data or systems. Then authorization methods determine if that person or entity is allowed to access the data, network, or applications in question.
Ideally, access control methods are easy to implement, but also have a good degree of complexity. Often, more complex forms of authentication and authorization take longer to process, creating a push and pull between security and ease of access. For business-wide implementation, access control models also need to be scalable and compatible across various devices and systems.
Cryptology and Encryption
In general, the various access control models use cryptology and encryption to solve the puzzle of how to protect IT systems and data. Encryption is a process that allows two people or entities to share information over an Internet connection without the data being readable to third-parties.
Encryption can also protect data in storage by coding or scrambling it in a way that can only be deciphered (in theory) by someone with the key that verifies the person is allowed to access the information. The appropriate key provides the cipher that can decode the message, allowing access to the encrypted data.
Encryption and access control systems generally use two kinds of encryption: symmetric and asymmetric. Symmetric encryption uses a cipher to change the content of a message in a specific way. A single private key encodes the content and provides the solution to decipher the information, and anyone who has that key can decode the message.
Asymmetric encryption uses a public key to encrypt sent data and a matching private key to decode the received message. This form of encryption provides more secure transmission of data, but also requires more time and computing power for processing.
As the processing power of computers grows stronger, cyber criminals will use that capability to crack the encryption codes that protect our transmitted data. Asymmetric encryption stands a better chance of resisting these attacks, and data scientists and mathematicians are working to find cryptology methods that will withstand the quantum computing capacity that is being developed.
Is Fractal Security the IT Solution of the Future
Fractal encryption is asymmetric and is one of the methods being studied for its ability to encrypt data securely in the face of quantum computers. Because fractals are relatively easy to construct but difficult to deconstruct without the cipher, fractal mathematics, algorithms, and processes have uses in access control models, cryptology, encryption, and more.
Fractal security methods offer scalability by their nature, and compatibility should be achievable as well. Can using fractals for cyber security also offer the relatively easy to implement but difficult to decode systems that are needed for IT security now and in the future?