Towards Practical Private Information Retrieval
Server holds a database
The client asks for a record
Server answers
Doesn't know what he was asked about
Doesn't know what he answered
Send the whole database over the wire
Communication O(n)
Computation O(1)
1 GB database ⇒ send 1 GB / request
We can do better
Communication O(log(n))
Computation O(nlog(n))
10 mln records, 1 GB database ⇒
send 1.5 MB / request
Now
Later
peer-to-peer
THE Port Pier 42