The £164,000 project by the company, which is based at ideaSpace City, secured co-funding under Innovate UK’s Smart Proof-of-Concept Fund to support SecureIoT – Novel ICMetric Security for the Internet of Things.
Metrarc will investigate the proof-of-concept of employing novel secure system techniques for deriving encryption keys from the operating characteristics of devices used in IoT applications and will focus on dedicated sensor systems for sport and healthcare.
The work will build on highly significant research results, underpinned by £2m of funding from EPSRC and the European Union. Metrarc’s technology is protected by a suite of international property rights IPR including two granted US patents.
As the IoT grows, the ability to establish trust in the identity and integrity of devices and infrastructure becomes a paramount concern in preventing cyber-crime in areas where user privacy and personal data need to be respected. Current encryption technologies store the encryption keys and this represents a vulnerability.
Metrarc’s founding CEO, Professor Klaus McDonald-Maier, said: “Metrarc’s ICMetric technology does not store encryption keys or any other data and is therefore of great potential interest to IoT applications, particularly where data security is paramount such as in healthcare applications.”
Dr Karl Heeks, Metrarc’s founder, said: “The market for security-based encryption for applications is growing rapidly and predicted to be enormous by 2020. We feel that there is a fantastic opportunity for key enabling technology from innovative companies such as Metrarc to help grow the IoT.”
For more information on Metrarc see www.metrarc.com