Storage drive manufacturer Western Digital (WD) has introduced high-capacity hard drives that promise to defend against hackers who are stealing data now to decrypt later when powerful quantum computers come online.
A new range of Ultrastar UltraSMR drives will feature post-quantum cryptography (PQC) that is stronger than today’s encryption technologies, making data stored onboard safe from prying eyes even it is exposed.
Aimed at cloud hyperscalers, the WD drives are timely for organisations that are increasingly worried about security risks posed by future quantum computers.
The threat has been heightened in recent years with AI generating and storing large volumes of data for training, inference and workflows. Organisations need to secure that data for many years, as that information may be valuable for decades or longer.
A key risk that WD highlighted is “harvest now, decrypt later” (HNDL), where attackers collect encrypted or signed data with the hope of decrypting or forging security signatures once quantum capabilities become more powerful.
The company also warned that firmware-level attacks could become more serious as quantum computing matures. Device-level trust becomes more important as adversaries could in the future forge digital signatures on firmware updates, making the malicious code look genuine and compromise devices at the hardware level.
To bolster its defences, the new WD Ultrastar DC HC6100 UltraSMR relies on algorithms approved by the United States’ National Institute of Standards and Technology, a standards body that develops guidelines that are closely followed by technology vendors.
In particular, WD’s PQC implementation uses the ML-DSA-87 algorithm for secure boot, firmware signing, and secure messaging. Along with dual-signing (using the classical RSA-3072 algorithm) and rollback safeguards, WD says organisations can deploy the hardened storage devices without disrupting operations.
Currently, the new drives are being tested by hyperscale customers, according to WD. It expects to expand PQC capabilities across additional enterprise hard drive product lines over time.
“As AI data compounds and becomes more valuable and long-lived, securing it for the future is no longer optional,” said Dr Xiaodong Che, WD’s chief technology officer.
“Integrating post-quantum cryptography into our Ultrastar enterprise-class drives is part of our commitment to helping customers stay ahead of threats that are already present in the form of HNDL attacks,” he added.
