For more than a decade, Washington has tried to address companies’ concerns about sharing cybersecurity data.
How zero-knowledge proofs answer the core tradeoff
Many organizations face a simple but brutal choice: tell the government whether a vulnerability exists, or keep secret the detailed scans and inventories that would prove it. Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) offer a different route. The technique allows a company to demonstrate the truth of a specific, agreed-upon statement — for example, that a named vulnerability is present within a defined set of systems — without revealing the underlying asset list, network map, software versions, or configuration details that could become an attacker’s roadmap.
Put another way, “a computer does not read a vulnerability scan the way a person does.” A ZKP converts the analyst’s decision process into a local mathematical calculation: the company runs its authorized scan data through a cryptographic routine that produces a proof tied to the final yes-or-no answer. The government or verifier receives only the proof and checks it against the agreed rules; it never sees the raw scan report.
Results from an FDD pilot with operational vulnerability data
The approach has moved beyond theory. FDD’s Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation tested ZKPs with anonymized vulnerability data drawn from three operational environments. The pilot posed yes-or-no questions about 38 known vulnerabilities while keeping the raw scans inside each participating environment. According to the test results, only the proofs and answers were shared, yet they revealed how widespread each vulnerability was across the environments — demonstrating the technical feasibility of producing truthful, privacy-preserving assertions about exposure.
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End the scramble →Why firms remain reluctant to share vulnerability scans
The pilot’s promise must be weighed against the reasons firms have guarded these data for years. A vulnerability scan is rich with sensitive detail: which devices are connected, which software is running, how systems are configured, and where defenses are weak. If that information is exposed, it can provide an adversary with a ready-made attack plan. Beyond the obvious operational risk, once sensitive data leaves a company it can be stolen, subpoenaed, passed to another agency or used in a regulatory proceeding the company never expected. As the source observes, industry is often asked to reduce its security risk by creating more risk elsewhere.
What CISA, NIST and regulatory agencies could do next
The article recommends pilots, not mandates. It lays out a staged approach: federal cyber officials and standards bodies should start with narrow, practical questions — for instance, whether a known vulnerability is present or whether a specific security control is in place — and only after pilot experience decide what underlying data can be trusted and what counts as sufficient proof in a regulatory setting. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and regulatory agencies are named as natural candidates to run these pilots. CISA already works with critical infrastructure operators on cyber risk; NIST can help define what a trustworthy proof should look like; and regulatory agencies could reduce private-sector headaches by developing more secure mechanisms for companies to share compliance information.
What this means for technologists, policymakers, and affected enterprises
- Technologists and security teams: test and validate ZKP toolchains against precise, narrow questions — the pilot model used by FDD focused on 38 known vulnerabilities and kept raw scans local.
- Policymakers and regulators: pursue structured pilots before embedding ZKPs into compliance regimes; decide later which proofs meet regulatory evidentiary standards.
- Affected enterprises and procurement leaders: weigh the potential to answer urgent, high-consequence questions without surrendering inventories or network diagrams, while demanding clarity on what proof verifiers will accept.
Zero-knowledge proofs will not eliminate every friction in cyber information-sharing. They do, however, tackle one of the toughest tensions: how to get trustworthy answers about exposure without forcing companies to hand over the maps attackers would use. The FDD pilot shows the concept can work; the sensible next step, the piece argues, is a program of focused pilots led by CISA, NIST and appropriate regulators so agencies can learn what a trustworthy proof looks like before relying on one in crisis or compliance contexts. In short: test now, learn deliberately, and avoid building policy on convenience or haste.
