Security
Quantum-era security, in plain English
Why the coming generation of computers matters for the data that protects your home, and exactly what we do about it, today versus what we are rolling out.
5 min readWe protect homes. That means we hold some of the most sensitive information there is about you: where your cameras are, the codes to your gates and alarm, the layout of your property, and the record of who came and went. We treat that data like it has to stay safe not just this year, but for the whole time you live in your home. That is why we plan for a threat most companies are still ignoring: quantum computing.
The short version: the connection between your devices and Serene is already protected with post-quantum encryption today. The deeper protections for the codes that open your home, and for the records we hand to emergency services, are what we are building next, and we will only ever tell you what is actually live.
What is the quantum threat, really?
Today's encryption relies on math that ordinary computers cannot undo in any reasonable amount of time. A large enough quantum computer, once it exists, could undo some of that math. Nobody has built one that can yet, and credible estimates put it years away. But there is a catch that makes it a today problem, not just a tomorrow problem:
"Harvest now, decrypt later." Someone can record encrypted data today and simply store it, waiting for the day a quantum computer can open it. So anything that must stay private for years, like the codes to your home, needs protection that will still hold up years from now, starting now.
Here is the reassuring part, and it is the honest one: not everything is exposed this way. A password you type to log in is only useful in the moment. But the layout of your home and the code to your gate are secrets for the life of the property. We focus the strongest protection exactly where it belongs.
What is protecting you today
These are live right now, not promises:
Live Post-quantum connection. Every connection between your browser or app and Serene is protected with a hybrid post-quantum key exchange (a NIST-standardized method combining today's proven encryption with the new quantum-resistant one). Recording it now does not help an attacker later.
Live Strong encryption at rest. Your stored data is encrypted with AES-256, the same standard governments use for top-secret information, which quantum computers do not meaningfully weaken.
Live Phishing-resistant sign-in for our systems. Staff access to the systems that hold your data uses passkeys tied to a registered device and a fingerprint or face, so there is no staff password to steal, guess, or phish. Your own account signs in with a password plus an independent backup code today.
What we are rolling out
These are our standard and our commitment. We are building them in stages, and we will not describe any of them as finished until they are:
Rolling out A vault for the codes that open your home, that even we cannot read. Gate PINs, alarm codes, lockbox combinations, and camera logins will be sealed with hybrid post-quantum encryption and held so that only your authorized operators can unlock them. If our own servers were ever breached, an attacker would find scrambled data, not your codes. A bank does not hold the keys to your house, and neither will a compromised Serene.
Rolling out Passkey sign-in for your account. The same passwordless, phishing-resistant sign-in our staff use today, extended to customer accounts.
Rolling out A tamper-evident, quantum-signed record for emergencies. When we provide information to emergency services, it will carry a sealed, quantum-signed, independently time-stamped record that any third party can verify on their own, so what we handled cannot be quietly altered after the fact, and the seal stays trustworthy for decades.
What this means for you
- You do not have to do anything. The connection protection is automatic, and the rest happens on our side.
- We protect the long-lived secrets hardest, because the code to your home should stay private for as long as it opens your home.
- We will not oversell it. You will not hear us say "unhackable" or "quantum-proof," because no honest security company can promise that. We will tell you precisely what is live and what is coming, which is what this page is.
Standards, in plain terms: the methods we use are the ones the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) finalized in 2024 for the quantum era (ML-KEM for encryption keys, ML-DSA for signatures), used in a hybrid so our protection is never weaker than today's proven encryption, only stronger.
Want the details?
Call or text and we will walk you through how we protect your home and your data.
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