What is SeQured?

SeQured is a Quantum Computing based technology that uses the a phenomemon called “Quantum Randomness” to generate unbreakable encryption keys resulting in a superior and practially unbreakable encryption.

SeQured was a proof of concept we developed during the hackathon mainly focusing on the healthcare application of the technology.

Background

I was one of 6 students selected from India to attend a global hackathon where top students from around the world come together in teams and compete on solving problems around social good with the quantum computing as the core technology.

Project Inception

The Team

My team like all other teams there was quite diverse and we had students across the board from college to PhD students. We were also paired with two mentors with experience in quantum technology to guide us along the path. The entire team had their expertise one or the other area making it obvious the selection criteria for the hackathons were quite thoughtful and difficult.

• George Watkins, Research Assistant, Aalto University

• Rahma Ahmed, Fullstack Software Engineer, Mount Sinai Health Partners

• Alaa Al Shaba, New York University in Abu Dhabi

• Akel Hashim, University of California at Berkeley

• Fayaz Mohamed Haneefa, Khalifa University

• Mandy Liao, New York University in Abu Dhabi

• Mohammed Tahri Sqalli, Hamad Bin Khalifa University

• Nadeen Nassif Mahmoud Sayed, Nile University

My Role and Workflow

Being someone new to quantum tech in general I was quite overwhelemed but thanks to the mentors and the support of entire team, we found synergy and even though unclear initially, I was able to add value by coming up with an potential solution to the problem we were tackling from a user experience which ended being used for the project.

I also led the complete presentation design, using humour to grab the audience’s attention and get them through technical explanations presented by other memebers.

The workflow in general was quite proactive as we worked together on a large bench and were continiuously bouncing ideas and thoughts, although inefficent in professional context, this is the best way to get things done in a hackathon envrironment.

How we built it

Exploring the technology

Quantum Computing is relatively newer developing feild with a very high barrier to entry - the availability of quantum computing resources is quite limited. By the time of the hackathon, there have been limited developments in the Quantum but there were a few applications that mostly everyone was focusing on.

While exchanging ideas with other teams, some of them sounded innvotive while most sounded quite mundane. Even if you had a killer idea, was it technically feasible to build within the 48 hour duration of the hackathon?

I could see a lot of people explaining each other what quantum computing really is and still noticing that most couldn’t grab it. It was a chaos. World’s smartest students & innovators were having a hard time understanding the core principle of the technology they were selected to work on. And honestly I think I was one of them.

Even by the end of hackathon, I dont think I understood it really well but knew enough I needed to work with and deliver & that worked out well.

Brainstorming

We were asked to solve problems for social good - but this was all we were told & it was up to us to decide where we take it from there. We initially took inspiration from UN’s Global Sustainability Goals to see if there was anywhere we could contribute.

Unfortunately nothing worked out, around first 12 hours of hackathon was all about brainstorming and trying to come up with something that could have a social impact while being feasible enough to be built within hackathon’s time limit. Turns out this was the case with most teams, some teams even aabondoned the ideas halfway realising it wont work.

After lot of discussion, research and coffee we finally decide to use the “Quantum Randomness” property of QC tech to build an encryption algorithm that generates enecryption keys that theoritically impossible to break making it the most secure encryption the world has ever seen.

But the way we decided to pair it up with a social cause was encrypting medical informaation as one of the member coming from a medical background suggested, but the main selling point of the idea was to make it accessible to common people and this is where I came up with a QR code based concept where shaaaring the medical data could be as simple as sharing a QR code with your doctor without ever worrying to deal with encryption keys ever again.

Storing medical information as encrypted QRs is quite a challenging concept to build and work on hence we decided to focus on building a proof of concept rather than a complete system.

Developing Proof of Concept

I wasnt really involved the actual development of the POC but was more focused on how this can this be presented to the audience. I was also involved in guiding a junior in our team. Luckily we were able to build the POC a night before the deadline leaving us some time to practice our presentation and who will explain which parts.

Presentation

We had to give an on stage presentation and the max duration was 2 minutes so there was a lot of improvisation on the spot.

Our presentation also included a video demo of how the POC could be used in a real world scenario, it also included a lot of technical explanation.

I tried my best to design presentation in a way that could have a catchy opening and keep the audience & judges engaged so they remember us.

Wrap up & Conclusion

Finally we emerged victorious and we all were really happy about it. We were also offered internships at NYU and partner companies but unfortunately there were only developer and QC based roles. All of were quite exhauseted and have barely gotten any sleep from last 2 days and some of us had flights back home in a few hours.

Overall it was a rollercoaster ride from building nothing into something. I am very proud of what we were able to accomplish in such a limited time span.

Milestones and Reflections

Achievements

• Winning the User Choice’s Award at the hackathon

Learnings and Revelations

• Initially you might not know everything about what you are meant to work on but eventually it

• You should get comfortable knowing thaat you dont know everything and frocus on stuff that you know and how can thaat be maximized

• Team work is very important - I was in no way a QC expert but by the end I was able to explain it to the audience and judges through the presentation.

• Humor and the presentation in general is extremely important to express the value of your work to anyone.

• Focusing on your strenegths while being aware of your weaaknesses or the lack of knowledge will better help you understand where you can add value to any project even if its beyond your skill level.