The UK and US governments have launched a set of prize challenges aimed at ‘unleashing’ the potential of privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs) to combat societal challenges around the world.

Competing for cash prizes from a combined UK-US pool of £1.3 million, academics, industry, and the broader public will be to participate.

The two separate tracks will be aimed at: improving detection of financial crime, spurring technological innovation to tackle the challenge of international money laundering which, according to the United Nations, costs up to $2 trillion each year; and forecasting individuals’ risk of infection during a pandemic.

There is also the option for entrants to design one generalised solution that works for both scenarios for broader applicability, the governments said.

PETs can be harnessed to facilitate privacy-preserving financial information sharing and collaborative analytics, enabling anomalous payments to be identified without compromising the privacy of individuals.

Innovators will work with synthetic global transaction data created by secure financial messaging provider SWIFT. Entrants will receive access to data that is realistic, but artificial, and therefore does not run the risk of revealing private information.

Alondra Nelson, head of the White House office of science and technology policy, said: “These prize challenges will catalyse talent and ingenuity on both sides of the Atlantic to advance privacy-enhancing technology solutions and enable their potential to tackle global challenges.”



She added: “This important initiative reflects our common purpose of developing technologies and driving innovation in a manner that reinforces our commitment to democratic values and the fundamental right to privacy.”

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