ZeroTier Quantum RC2 moves post-quantum security toward GA

ZeroTier has released Release Candidate 2 (RC2) of ZeroTier Quantum, its end-to-end quantum-secure networking platform. This final testing milestone brings the solution one step closer to general availability (GA), marking a critical transition in enterprise network security.

ZeroTier Quantum directly confronts the existential threat that quantum computing poses to current encryption standards. The platform meets the NIST and NSA’s highest CNSA 2.0 standards, exceeding the post-quantum cryptography (PQC) requirements mandated by the U. S. government for regulated industries starting in 2027. It is built to protect sensitive data from both “harvest now, decrypt later” and “trust now, forge later” attacks.

“Reaching our final release candidate milestone brings us to the precipice of a new era in network security,” said Andrew Gault, CEO of ZeroTier. “ZeroTier Quantum isn’t an incremental update; it’s a fundamental paradigm shift. We’ve successfully added quantum-resistant cryptographic agility into our core architecture, while increasing the performance and resilience our customers depend upon. As we finalize our path to general availability, we’re giving organizations the tools to protect their data today against the quantum threats of tomorrow.”

The roadmap to GA includes finalizing a third-party code audit and penetration test. Parallel efforts for cryptographic validation and support for AI platforms are also nearing completion.

Security, performance, and flexibility form the foundation of ZeroTier Quantum RC2. The platform delivers quantum defense without adding operational friction. It uses a zero-trust, memory-safe architecture built in Rust and leverages the ZeroTier Protocol (ZTP). By pairing ML-KEM-1024 and hybrid AES-384 cryptography with mutual identity authentication, it provides software-defined end-to-end protection across all key attack vectors. This defense-in-depth approach ensures seamless compliance with FIPS and CNSA 2.0 standards.

Performance is driven by a peer-to-peer mesh architecture that uses automatic path selection to eliminate bottlenecks, bypass congestion, and offer high resilience. The platform achieves 30% lower CPU utilization compared to similar software-defined networking platforms. A lightweight control plane and intelligent buffering reduce memory overhead, ensuring high-performance scalability. Built-in hardware cryptographic acceleration and parallelized transport maintain high throughput without introducing network latency.

Flexibility extends across deployment privacy levels and network topologies. An infrastructure-agnostic policy fabric combined with true Layer 2 virtualization emulates a global Ethernet switch, allowing the platform to adapt instantly to any configuration or moving endpoint. This ensures seamless execution across public cloud, sovereign, or air-gapped deployments while extending secure downstream connectivity to edge and IoT devices incapable of running native agents.

Market adoption is already accelerating. ZeroTier has secured numerous commercial and proof-of-concept (PoC) relationships ahead of the GA release. These engagements span highly specialized and high-stakes industries, ranging from tactical networks to drone operations to critical manufacturing.

“Our strategy has been clear and the marketplace traction we’re seeing with ZeroTier Quantum in its core configuration ahead of GA has been brisk,” said Robert Stevenson, CCO at ZeroTier. “Our securing commercial and PoC relationships across defense, enterprise cloud, and critical infrastructure proves that quantum-resilience is no longer a theoretical concern. It’s an operational requirement. Organizations running COMSEC-grade communications or managing high-value assets recognize that waiting is a risk they don’t need to take. ZeroTier Quantum gives them immediate acceleration in their quantum journey and future-proofing for their networks today.”