Computing on Encrypted Data: FHE and FE

What it is

Techniques that let an untrusted party compute on data it cannot read. Fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) evaluates arbitrary functions on ciphertexts; functional encryption (FE) releases only a specific function of the plaintext to a key holder.

Why it matters — security & society

These tools dissolve the usual trade-off between using data and protecting it. They make privacy-preserving machine learning, encrypted medical and genomic analysis, and confidential cloud computation possible — analyzing sensitive records without ever exposing them. As data regulation tightens and outsourced computation grows, computing on encrypted data is becoming a practical foundation, not just a theoretical dream.

Books & surveys

• Homomorphic Encryption — tutorial chapter — Shai Halevi. A readable end-to-end tour of FHE.
• Computing Blindfolded: New Developments in FHE — Vinod Vaikuntanathan. Short, high-level survey.
• More on FHE.
• A nice collection of papers on functional encryption
• Functional Encryption library - CiFEr, dmcfe

Lecture notes & courses

• Computing on Encrypted Data — Vinod Vaikuntanathan. FHE, FE, and more, with a full reading list. (course)