Google previews MPC security system for crypto and tokenized assets

Google will preview Google Multi-Party Compute, a security system for banks and other financial institutions to safeguard and move cryptocurrencies and tokenized assets, on Wednesday at its inaugural digital assets symposium in New York City.

Google Multi-Party Compute is in private preview, with several design partners and major financial institutions testing it, Google told CoinDesk. Alphabet, the parent company, has begun using it to secure its own digital assets on the Ethereum and Solana blockchains.

For an allocator diligencing a custodian that adopts the service, signing, transaction policies and key recovery arrive as one vendor product rather than three capabilities the institution assembles itself. That shifts the questions to the vendor's boundary: which keys the client controls, what the transaction-policy layer can block, and who executes recovery when a key fragment holder is unavailable.

MPC is not new to digital assets, nor is Google's involvement in the technology. In 2023, Google published guidance explaining how customers could build MPC-based digital-asset systems using its Confidential Space infrastructure. Its existing production services include Google Cloud Key Management Service and Cloud HSM, which institutions use to manage and protect cryptographic keys. Google said it has not previously offered a dedicated MPC custody product for cryptocurrencies.

The preview lands as banks and other financial companies explore using blockchains to issue tokenized assets, process payments and offer digital asset custody services. Those activities require institutions to securely authorize transactions that, once completed on a blockchain, generally cannot be reversed. An attacker who gains control of the private key protecting a wallet may be able to transfer its assets without the owner's permission, making key management a central security challenge for institutions entering the market.

Rich Widmann, director of digital assets strategy at Google Cloud, told CoinDesk that regulated institutions moving onto blockchains need infrastructure to secure client assets. "Digital asset adoption and tokenization are at an inflection point," he said.

Google plans to make Google Multi-Party Compute commercially available in early 2027. Pricing has not been disclosed.