Intel's Heracles chip computes fully-encrypted data without decrypting it
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Intel's Heracles chip computes fully-encrypted data without decrypting it — chip is 1,074 to 5,547 times faster than a 24-core Intel Xeon in FHE math operations | Tom's Hardware Skip to main content Don't miss these Windows Microsoft promises to nearly double Windows storage performance after forcing slow software-accelerated BitLocker on Windows CPUs Intel's make-or-break 18A process node debuts for data center with 288-core Xeon 6+ CPU Artificial Intelligence Intel's roadmap adds mysterious 'hybrid' AI processor featuring x86 CPUs, dedicated AI accelerator, and programmable IP CPUs Intel Panther Lake-H high-res die shot emerges Artificial Intelligence AMD touts Instinct MI430X, MI440X, and MI455X AI accelerators and Helios rack-scale AI architecture at CES CPUs Intel's upcoming Core Ultra 9 mobile CPU outperforms most desktop counterparts in new benchmark Semiconductors Intel displays tech to build extreme multi-chiplet packages 12 times the size of the largest AI processors, beating TSMC's biggest CPUs China-made Loongson 12-core chip is approximately three times slower than six-core Ryzen 5 9600X Semiconductors Intel shows off leading-edge tech with massive AI processor test vehicle CPUs Intel Xeon 6 selected as host CPU for Nvidia DGX Rubin NVL8 systems CPUs Intel Bartlett Lake-S CPUs reportedly wield 12 blazing P-cores and 5.8 GHz boost CPUs Intel preps CPUs with 'Unified Core' architecture — job listing hints at evolution beyond Intel's hybrid design Artificial Intelligence AMD unwraps Instinct MI500 boasting 1,000X more performance versus MI300X Tech Industry Apple and Nvidia considering Intel for 2028 chip production, report claims CPUs Intel's upcoming Core Ultra 9 290K Plus posts ~10% better Geekbench scores than current flagship (Image credit: Intel) Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Tom's Hardware Get the Tom's Hardware Newsletter Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. You are now subscribed Your newsletter sign-up was successful An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter Modern encryption technologies enable modern systems to protect data while it is stored on a storage device, transferred over various links inside the system, or even hosted in DRAM waiting for its turn to be processed. But once it reaches the CPU, GPU, or other type of processor, it gets decrypted and shows itself essentially as plain text, making it vulnerable to various classes of attacks. Go deeper with TH Premium: CPU (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) CPU scaling with DLSS Ryzen to the top: How AMD innovated in the gaming CPU market How ARM is working its way into PCs AMD CES 2026 gaming trends press Q&A roundtable transcript To completely protect data from risks like side attacks, DMA attacks, or hypervisor snooping, Intel has developed a processor that operates on encrypted data without first decrypting it. Now the company has demoed the chip, reports IEEE Spectrum , and Intel claims impressive gains in math operations used to process fully-encrypted data. Intel introduced and demonstrated its Heracles accelerator featuring fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) — meaning that it ingests encrypted data, processes it, and outputs it in an encrypted format — last month at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference ( ISSCC ). The chip is by no means an x86 CPU. It cannot execute normal software or run an operating system, as it is designed exclusively to accelerate fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) math. Article continues below You may like Microsoft promises to nearly double Windows storage performance after forcing slow software-accelerated BitLocker on Windows Intel's make-or-break 18A process node debuts for data center with 288-core Xeon 6+ CPU Intel's roadmap adds mysterious 'hybrid' AI processor featuring x86 CPUs, dedicated AI accelerator, and programmable IP Being a purpose-built chip, when it comes to acceleration of FHE math, the new chip operating at 1.20 GHz is roughly 1,074 to 5,547 times faster than a 24-core Intel Xeon W7-3455 'Sapphire Rapids' running at 2.50 GHz – 4.80 GHz in seven operations used in this type of workload, according to Intel. From a technical standpoint, Heracles is a sharp departure from conventional CPUs and GPUs, both of which struggle with the mathematical demands of encrypted workloads. FHE math depends on extremely large integers, intensive polynomial calculations, and complex data transformations that quickly overwhelm general-purpose processors. Intel's Heracles relies on a purpose-designed architecture that uses an 8192-way SIMD compute engine composed of 64 tile-pairs (i.e., each tile-pair contains 128 parallel arithmetic lanes) arranged in an 8×8 mesh. Each tile integrates arithmetic units optimized for modular addition, subtraction, multiplication, and specialized butterfly operations that support number-theoretic transforms (NTT) and inverse NTTs. These NTTs and inverse NTTs are key to encrypted computation but require heavy data movement and tightly coordinated permutations. In addition, the accelerator supports automorphisms and bootstrapping operations to remove accumulated cryptographic noise and enable longer computational chains. (Image credit: Intel) The system-on-chip operates with 32-bit arithmetic slices (i.e., each lane inside TP processes a 32-bit arithmetic slice) to preserve precision and ensure high parallelism, which greatly improves the efficiency of processing encrypted math at scale. However, efficient explicitly parallel execution also requires high memory bandwidth. To that end, the chip is equipped with 48 GB of HBM3 memory using two stacks as well as custom data paths to maximize the internal bandwidth of terabytes per second. The chip further includes 64 MB of internal scratchpad memory, large register files, and dedicated buffers that stage data close to compute engines. Stay On the Cutting Edge: Get the Tom's Hardware Newsletter Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors At peak, Hercules reaches approximately 29.5 TOPS for butterfly primitives, about 9.8 TOPS for modular arithmetic, and multi-terabit per second throughput for transform operations, according to Intel. The processor supports multiple major FHE schemes, including BGV, BFV, and CKKS, and allows programmability across different parameter sets and security levels. The processor runs at 1.2 GHz, occupies 197 mm², operates within a 176W power envelope, and is fabricated using Intel 3 process technology. Heracles is currently implemented as a PCIe accelerator card installed alongside standard servers and uses liquid cooling to manage its thermals. Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News , or add us as a preferred source , to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds. Go deeper with TH Premium: CPU (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) CPU scaling with DLSS Ryzen to the top: How AMD innovated in the gaming CPU market How ARM is working its way into PCs AMD CES 2026 gaming trends press Q&A roundtable transcript TOPICS See all comments (0) Anton Shilov Contributing Writer Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends. 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