The EDA tools that are used to design chips do not support diagonal wires so that kind of rules out hexagonal grids. With only horizontal and vertical wires you end up with rectangular/square grids or rings.
Encryption keys, being purely random, are not copyrightable. (In light of recent events, this raises the question of artisanal human-created keys.) Distributing keys probably violates DMCA section 1201 though.
“Completely air-gapping this infrastructure—that is, disconnecting it entirely from external networks—isn’t currently feasible, since we need external connections in order to run and monitor experiments”
It's not a good look that the UK seemingly isn't installing air conditioning, decarbonizing heating, or adopting electric vehicles. Efficiency is good after you have high living standards but the UK should probably focus on growth first.
There have been plenty of open source projects that view themselves as natural monopolies and treat the existence of alternatives as something akin to high treason. They never admit this of course.