As the wave of the digital economy sweeps across all kinds of industries, strengthening the security protection of critical information infrastructure through commercial cryptography and escorting the digital economy growth has become a new historical mission of China's commercial cryptography. Promoting the high-quality development of commercial cryptography has become an urgent issue of the times. On May 10, the 2024 Trust and Interconnection Convention was successfully held under the theme of "Promoting High-Quality Development of Commercial Cryptography".

This conference was guided by the National Technical Committee 260 on Cybersecurity of Standardization Administration of China (hereinafter referred to as TC260) and the Hubei Provincial Cryptography Administration, hosted by the WG4 Working Group of TC260, the Electronic Certification Committee of the Chinese Association for Cryptologic Research, and the Hubei Commercial Cryptography Association, and co-organized by the School of Cryptology of the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, FuTURE Mobile Communication Forum, and Certificate Authority (Wuhan) Co., Ltd.

The Trust and Interconnection Convention is the first national conference focusing on "digital trust" in China. And 2024 was the third consecutive year. Government officials from national, provincial, and municipal departments as well as heads from the TC260 attended the conference and delivered speeches. Zhan Banghua, Vice Director of the Electronic Certification Committee of the Chinese Association for Cryptologic Research and Chairman of Beijing Certificate Authority (BJCA), presided over the main forum in the morning.

The conference invited government officials from the cryptographic departments of Hebei, Shanxi, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Henan, Hubei, Chongqing, Shaanxi, Ningxia, and Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. Relevant heads from Hubei organizations, including the Cyberspace Administration of Hubei, Hubei National Security Office, Hubei Justice Department, Hubei Agriculture and Rural Affairs Department, Hubei Department of Commerce, Hubei Data Bureau, Wuhan University, and Huazhong University of Science and Technology, also came to provide instructions. And there were more than 500 guests from dozens of industries such as medical care, finance, education, and transportation gathered together to discuss the efficient development route of commercial cryptography, adding new impetus to the construction of Digital China.

From the frontier of cryptography to a new business form of trust? Experts share new directions and new requirements of cryptography.

Gong Ke, Executive Director of the Chinese Institute of New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Strategies and Director of Haihe Laboratory of Information Technology Application Innovation, gave a keynote speech on the spot entitled "Rethinking Information Security in the Era of Intelligence". He pointed out that artificial intelligence is a kind of new quality productive force and the trend of intelligence is unstoppable. In order to promote the effective integration of AI and commercial cryptography, AI requires a large amount of data for training and reasoning (thus cryptographic protection is indispensable for data and models). What's more, artificial intelligence technologies such as machine learning and neural networks can also effectively improve the security of cryptography and enhance information security.

Researcher Wang Jianhua, a well-known cryptography expert, shared his “Thoughts on Cryptography Applications in Critical Information Infrastructure”. He said that the protection of critical information infrastructure is an important battlefield for the high-quality development of China's commercial cryptography in the next few years. Nowadays, facing the challenges posed by the need to ensure a safe and stable operation of critical information infrastructure to cryptographic applications, the main idea is to establish a working system that coordinates among the national cryptographic administration department, protection department, and operators, as well as implement the main responsibility of operators for cryptographic applications. The key is to ensure a closed loop of each link, such as planning, construction, and operation when carrying out the systematic construction of cryptographic applications. In the process of building the security protection capability of cryptography operation, it is necessary to focus on the hierarchical warning of cryptographic operation status and the hierarchical handling of security incidents.

Yu Junqing, a member of the Standing Committee of the Party Committee and Vice President of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, delivered a speech entitled "Research on the Endogenous Security System of IPv6 in Cloud-Network Integration Environment". He said that in order to truly achieve cloud-network integration, it is necessary to overcome multiple challenges in terms of system architecture, coordinated scheduling, and resource allocation. The IPv6-based cloud-network integration endogenous security system has realized two-way transparency of the network, reduced system overhead effectively, and enabled fine-grained management and rapid traceability of different tenants, accelerating the development of cloud-network integration.

Zhang Jianrong, member of the CPC Committee, Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Security Business Unit of China Unicom Digital Technology Co., Ltd., delivered a keynote speech on "Strengthening cryptographic Protection of Digital Infrastructure, Serving the Digital Trust Building of Smart Cities". He said that as a builder and operator of digital infrastructure, China Unicom has bravely shouldered the important task of being the chain head of the modern industrial chain of network security. Based on the cryptographic infrastructure, it has built a trusted digital trust foundation for China Unicom, realized trusted data storage, trusted identity authentication, and trusted transmission encryption. Relying on the "Mogong" security operation service platform, it has created an integrated defense in depth security system of "cloud- network based digitization and service", provided city-level security operation services, and safeguarded the construction of digital trust in smart cities.

Ding Jintai, a joint-appointed professor at the Yau Mathematical Sciences Center, Tsinghua University, and the Beijing Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Applications, gave a speech on the topic of "A Historic Challenge in the Era of Digital Economy: Post Quantum Cryptography Migration". He talked about how electronic signatures based on public key cryptography solved the trust problem in the era of large-scale computer networks. With the advent of the quantum computing, a new cybersecurity industry ecosystem is taking shape. The long-term security of the network must use quantum-resistant cryptography, and the migration to quantum-resistant cryptography is urgent.

Jing Jiwu, Dean of the School of Cryptology at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, delivered a keynote speech on "Using Cryptographic Technique to Solve Trust Issues in Communications". The communications ecosystem has been challenged by rampant international and domestic harassing calls. He addressed that the implementation of a national standard communications trust "white list", advancement of national standards implementation, and the adoption of trusted communications solutions based on cryptographic tokens (CHAKEN) can ensure end-to-end security, save operators' investment costs, and have broad application prospects.

Zhang Zhenfeng, Deputy Chief Engineer of the Institute of Software, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Director of the Trusted Computing and Information Assurance Laboratory, delivered a speech on "Identity Authentication Modernization in the Era of Generative AI". He pointed out that in the era of generative artificial intelligence, phishing by using AI to forge videos, sounds, or emails has become more complex and large-scale, and user identity authentication faces severe challenges. Through strong cryptographic authentication, the modern identity authentication technology, which can resist phishing, will effectively improve network security and interactive security, and support the rapid development of artificial intelligence.

Lin Xueyan, General Manager of Beijing Certificate Authority Co., Ltd., delivered a keynote speech on "Exploration and Practice of Software-Defined Endogenous Cryptographic Computing Power". He pointed out that in the digital world where "everything is connected and everything is programmable", software defines the future. The BJCA launched the "Kunmi" cryptographic computing platform, which is based on the trusted execution environment (TEE) of the domestically produced IT application innovation CPU chips. It is a software-defined innovative cryptographic computing architecture with four major characteristics: endogenous, agile, distributed, and flexible. It can realize unified cryptographic computing scheduling, software-implemented cryptographic management, and comprehensive serviced-based cryptographic capabilities.

From technology empowerment to application implementation
Experts discussed new opportunities of cryptography? The latest achievements displayed in the exhibition hall

He Debiao, President of Hubei Commercial Cryptography Association and Professor of Wuhan University, hosted the thematic forum in the afternoon. Professional elites from education, enterprise, energy, transportation and other fields, together with experts from Huawei, Hubei ChuTianYun Co., Ltd., Beijing Normal University, Petro-CyberWorks Information Technology Co., Ltd., and Beijing Certificate Authority, expressed their views on a number of hot topics including smart cities construction, data security governance, trusted campuses, and Internet of Vehicles security, shared the latest practices, and contributed wisdom to the construction of digital trust systems and commercial cryptography protection systems.

In the exhibition hall outside the convention venue, a series of recent achievements and application cases in the field of commercial cryptography were also displayed. The on-site large screen displayed the issuance of national CA certificates and the coordination status of various cryptographic resources of the cryptographic infrastructure data analysis center. In the Digital China exhibition area, there were plenty of solutions and wide applications of commercial cryptography in multiple industries such as enterprise digital transformation, smart medical products administration, digital finance, digital government, smart transportation, smart education, smart people's livelihood, smart healthcare, and intelligent connected vehicles.

The 2024 Trust and Interconnection Convention is not only about building an authoritative platform for the release of the latest commercial cryptography achievements and the matching of supply and demand, but also about gathering wisdom from industry experience and jointly exploring new routes for the development of digital trust and cryptography in the era of digital economy. In the new era of commercial cryptography transformation, it is time to build industry consensus and empower the development of the digital economy by virtue of the convention platform.