Karim Eldefrawy

Cryptography, Cybersecurity, Privacy Computer Science

Co-founder & CTO of Confidencial.io
2017-2021: SRI
2011-2016: HRL Laboratories
2006-2010: PhD@UC Irvine

Scientific curiosity

Extramurally funded R&D · 2013–2026

Extramurally Funded Projects

Research programs connecting protected information, verifiable encrypted computation, private communication, emerging computing, and resilient systems.

Six areas of funded R&D

Project Topics

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  • 3 awards Data and Document Security Watermarking · protected CUI workflows
  • 2 projects Verified Encrypted Computation FHE acceleration · zero-knowledge verification
  • 2 projects Private & Anonymous Communication Protected overlays · anonymous messaging
  • 2 projects Health & Private Biometrics Cognitive health · cryptographic biometrics
  • 1 project Quantum-powered Security Quantum optimization for Internet security
  • 2 projects Cloud & Cyber-Physical Security Secure cloud control · resilient CPS
Primary-topic view of 12 funded awards; several projects contribute to more than one area.

At Confidencial.io from 2022 to 202X:

  • 2026: PI of Phase 1 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project on “Secure Covert Watrmarking of Unstructured Documents”, funded by the US Air Force AFWERX program.
  • 2024-2025: PI of Phase 2 STTR project on “Securing Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) in Document Storage, Sharing, and Request”, funded by the US Air Force AFWERX program.
  • 2023-2024: PI of Confidencial.io’s work in SRI’s project “CHALO: Cognitive Health Assistant that Learns and Organizes”, funded by ARPA-H DIGIHEALS program.
  • 2023: PI of Phase 1 Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) project on “Securing Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) in Document Storage, Sharing, and Request”, funded by the US Air Force AFWERX program.
  • 2022-2023: Co-PI of “PICO: Protected Integrated Communication Overlay,” funded by the NSF 5G Security Convergence Accelerator.

At SRI from 2017 to 2022:

  • 2021-2022: PI of “FARSIDE: Formally-verified Accelerator for Ring-based Secure Iterative-evaluation of Data under Encryption,” funded by DARPA under the Data Protection in Virtual Environments (DPRIVE) program.
  • 2020: Co-PI of “LOQI: Leveraging Optimization using Quantum-devicesfor Internet-security” in a team led by PI Prof. Wim van Dam from QC Ware funded by the Air Force Quantum Collider program.
  • 2020-2022: Co-PI of “EMPHASIZE: End-to-end Machinery for Proving Highly-sensitive Application-oriented Statements In ZEro-knowledge,” funded by DARPA under the Securing Information for Encrypted Verification and Evaluation (SIEVE) program.
  • 2019-2023: PI of “PRISM: PRivacy-preserving Intrusion-resilient Secure Multi-party-computation (for anonymous messaging),” funded by DARPA under the Resilient Anonymous Communication for Everyone (RACE) program.

At HRL from 2011 to 2017:

  • 2016-2017: PI of “ABC: Acquiring Biometrics with Cryptography,” funded by IARPA under the Open Call Broad Agency Annoucement.
  • 2015-2017: Task Lead in “Side-channel Security Analysis and Secure Software Updates for Cyber-Physical Systems,” funded by the DHS Science and Technology divison under the Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) program.
  • 2013-2016: Task Lead in “Cloud-COP: A Secure Cloud Control and Operation Plane,” funded by the DHS Science and Technology divison under the Open Call Broad Agency Annoucement.