Digital security giant Gemalto and Symbiont, the smart securities platform developer, have announced they are working together to enable financial services organizations to securely execute smart contracts and other blockchain-based transactions. Through their partnership, Symbiont will use Gemalto’s SafeNet Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) to protect blockchain identities and transactions, in order to prevent theft, forgery, and other malfeasance.
Symbiont’s platform uses blockchain technology to allow institutions and investors to issue, manage and trade a range of financial instruments. These ‘Smart Securities’, are self-enforcing, self-executing contracts that offer cost and time efficiencies compared with traditional methods. Symbiont’s integration of Gemalto’s SafeNet HSMs will allow high levels of regulatory compliance and trust for cryptographic identities authorizing these transactions.
Mark Yakabuski, Vice President of Business Development Strategy at Gemalto, stated:
Bringing Gemalto’s market-leading HSM security modules assurance to Symbiont’s Smart Contract Blockchain solution is not only an exciting offering, but a clear step towards securing Blockchain-based transactions. We look forward to helping customers add trust to the emerging smart contracts space.
Managing Director at Symbiont, Louis Stone, noted:
No corners can be cut in securing information in the ‘distributed trust’ environment enabled by blockchain technology. To seize the opportunity in capital markets, each facet has to be best-of-breed. The combination of Gemalto’s industry-leading HSMs and Symbiont’s Smart SecuritiesTM delivers just that.
Once a security is issued onto the ledger powered by the Symbiont Smart Securities platform, it acts autonomously, eliminating the need for manual input thereafter. These transactions and identities will be secured by Gemalto’s SafeNet HSMs which will protect the cryptographic keys and provide encryption, decryption, authentication and digital signing services for the smart contract transactions.
Gemalto’s SafeNet HSMs are dedicated cryptographic processors specifically designed for protection of the lifecycle of cryptographic keys that secures transactions, identities and applications. SafeNet HSMs are trust anchors that protect by securely managing, processing, and storing cryptographic keys inside a hardened, tamper-resistant device and provide a broad ecosystem of integrated technology partners.
Symbiont was formed earlier in 2015 by the founders of Bitcoin-based protocol Counterparty, Robbie Dermody (President), Evan Wagner and Adam Krellenstein (CTO), along with Mark Smith, the founder of MathMoney (fx). In August 2015, Symbiont was the first to issue securities on a blockchain, the Bitcoin blockchain.
