'Crypto' for 'Cryptography': How Justified Is the Exuberance Around Apple's Developer CryptoKit?

Crypto media went abuzz over yet another promising development, as it became known that Apple is poised to present a set of cryptographic developer tools.

Alejandro Machado, co-founder of Open Money Initiative, told The Block that cryptocurrency developers will capitalize on the new feature that CryptoKit offers: the capacity to leverage iPhone's secure enclave - a hardware pocket disconnected from the processor - to reach the level of security comparable to that of hardware wallets.

Apple announced CryptoKit for iOS 13, only a few steps away before you can turn your phone into a hardware wallet.

Blockchain developer Ronald Mannak countered the growing bullish sentiment with a series of tweets, deconstructing what CryptoKit is and what it is not.

With some improved functionality, CryptoKit is good news for developers but not "The game changer" for the broader crypto space, as compatibility of its affordances with Ethereum and other blockchains remains limited.

Apple CryptoKit is a framework that comes with the iOS 13 update.

"The new framework will provide easy-to-use and efficient options for hashing, key generation, key exchange and encryption for developers. All these operations are essential for building cryptocurrency wallets. CryptoKit allows to store private keys in the secure enclave which will hugely increase the protection of these keys and allow for secure public-key cryptography. Current documentation suggests that developers will not have direct access to private keys, therefore these are going to be securely protected and stored on a device."

"The current implementation of CryptoKit does not support secp2561k1 curve used by Ethereum and other blockchains, therefore it has a limited applicability for cryptocurrency applications at the moment. Support for these algorithms can be added in future updates, but it is not clear when it will happen. CryptoKit brings easy-to-use cryptography to all applications and it does not limit itself to crypto-related applications."

"Despite the expected market reaction that connected CryptoKit with blockchain and bitcoin, it has nothing to do specifically with those cryptocurrencies. CryptoKit will simplify data encryption and decryption operations, which are used in many other areas, including backups, secure emailing and messages, password generation, and many others. However, natively implemented data encryption algorithms will definitely boost the development of mobile nodes for new lightweight and non-PoW cryptocurrencies, providing millions of iPhone and iPad users with mobile access to microtransactions in the future."

Overall, while the community's initial enthusiasm with regard to CryptoKit may be somewhat overblown, in the long run it should further the cryptocurrency movement's strategic objectives.