A brief survey on encrypted control: From the first to the second generation and beyond

Abstract

This article provides a comprehensive and illustrative presentation of the young field of encrypted control. In particular, we survey the evolution of encrypted controllers from their first appearance in 2015 until 2023 and derive a categorization into two generations mainly characterized by the utilized cryptographic methods. We further envision future developments and challenges of encrypted control. Throughout our presentation, we build less on technicalities but rather on intuitive tutorial-style explanations. This way, we intend to build a bridge from control engineering to cryptography and to make the interdisciplinary field of encrypted control more accessible.