Confidential Computing
Hardware-based protection of data while it is being processed, using trusted execution environments that isolate computation from the host system.
Confidential Computing is the hardware-based protection of data while it is being processed. Encryption has long protected data at rest and in transit; Confidential Computing closes the third gap, data in use, by running computation inside trusted execution environments (TEEs) that isolate it even from the operator of the host system.
A TEE is a hardware-enforced enclave: memory is encrypted, the code running inside can be cryptographically attested, and neither the hypervisor, the operating system, nor a cloud provider's administrators can inspect the workload. Modern server platforms ship this capability in the CPU and, increasingly, in the GPU.
For AI workloads, Confidential Computing is a building block for running sensitive inference and training with enforceable privacy guarantees. It complements Private AI: even inside an owned boundary, TEEs harden the most sensitive workloads against insider and supply-chain threats.