Events Calendar

CS Colloquium: Joseph Bonneau (Stanford) - Cryptographic transparency

Speaker: Joseph Bonneau, Stanford

Talk Title: Cryptographic transparency

Series: CS Colloquium

Abstract: This lecture satisfies requirements for CSCI 591: Computer Science Research Colloquium

Traditionally, cryptography aims to eliminate trusted authorities and reduce security to computational assumptions: the system is secure as long as attackers can't guess a random key or solve a hard mathematical problem. This talk will discuss an alternate approach: retain centralized authorities but use cryptography to provide transparency that they are behaving correctly. I'll present two examples: ensuring a public key server is serving keys consistently and ensuring a Bitcoin exchange controls enough funds to be solvent. Reasoning about the security of these systems require a more holistic approach, modeling user actions and economic incentives.

Biography: Joseph Bonneau is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Stanford University and a Technology Fellow at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. His research focuses on cryptography and security protocols, particularly how they interact with human and organizational behavior and economic incentives. Recently he has focused on Bitcoin and related cryptocurrencies and secure messaging tools. He is also known for his work on passwords and web authentication. He received a PhD from the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Ross Anderson and an BS/MS from Stanford under the supervision of Dan Boneh. Last year he was as a Postdoctoral Fellow at CITP, Princeton and he has previously worked at Google, Yahoo, and Cryptography Research Inc.

Host: CS Department

Location: Olin Hall of Engineering (OHE) - 136

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Assistant to CS chair