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Keynote Speakers

Huaxiong Wang Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Abstract: Combinatorics has been playing an active role in cryptography, from the designs of cryptographic constructions, security proofs to cryptanalysis. Combinatorial cryptography refers to a sub-field of cryptography where combinatorics and cryptography are interacted significantly. In this talk, I will present several concrete examples to illustrate how combinatorial objects and techniques are applied to the constructions of cryptographic schemes such as in secret sharing, threshold cryptography and secure multiparty computation.

Bio: Prof Huaxiong Wang received a PhD in Mathematics from University of Haifa, Israel in 1996 and a PhD in Computer Science from University of Wollongong, Australia in 2001. He has been with Nanyang Technological University in Singapore since 2006, where he served as the Head of Division of Mathematical Sciences from 2013 to 2015. Currently he is also the deputy director of the university researcher centre: Strategic Centre for Research in Privacy-Preserving Technologies & Systems (SCRIPTS) funded by the National Research Foundation of Singapore. Prior to NTU, he held faculty positions at Macquarie University and University of Wollongong in Australia, and visiting positions at ENS de Lyon in France, Fujian Normal University in China, City University of Hong Kong, National University of Singapore and Kobe University in Japan.

Jing Chen Algorand

Abstract: In the past decade blockchain technology has attracted tremendous attention from both academia and industry. It is the technology of choice to realize decentralized ledgers that are transparent, autonomous, and tamperproof. It reduces the dependence on intermediaries and introduces a new trust structure in transaction systems, so that entities from all over the world can transact directly.

The development of blockchains has been enabled by and has in turn triggered research in many fields such as distributed computation, cryptography, and programming languages, just to name a few. In this talk I’ll discuss several important technical challenges and research topics brought up by blockchains.

Bio: Jing Chen is Chief Scientist and Head of Theory Research at Algorand. Her main research interests are distributed ledgers, smart contracts, game theory, mechanism design, and algorithms. Previously, she was a faculty member in the Computer Science Department at Stony Brook University and an affiliated faculty member in the Economics Department. Jing received her bachelor's and master’s degrees in computer science from Tsinghua University, and her PhD in computer science from MIT. She received the NSF CAREER Award in 2016.

Yuval Yarom University of Adelaide, Australia

Abstract: When multiple programs execute on the same computer, they share the use of the microarchitectural resources. Because program execution affects the state of the microarchitecture and the state of the architecture affects program execution time, measuring execution time can reveal information on the state of the microarchitecture, and with it on prior execution of other programs. Thus, such micoroarchitectural timing attacks leak information by measuring variations in program execution time.

As these attacks often measure minute variations, at the order of few nanoseconds, multiple proposed defences aim at depriving attackers of high-resolution clocks. In response, counter-proposals that show how to overcome these defences have been published. In this talk we look at the ensuing armed-race and explore techniques for limiting timer resolution and for carrying out attacks with restricted timers. We will take a close look at the impact of low-resolution clocks on microarchitectural attacks, explore techniques for amplifying signals by over six orders of magnitude, and demonstrate how attackers can perform high-frequency, high-resolution attacks without using high-resolution clocks.

Bio: Yuval Yarom is an Associate Professor at the School of Computer Science at the University of Adelaide. He earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Adelaide in 2014, and an M.Sc. in Computer Science and a B.Sc. in Mathematics and Computer Science from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1993 and 1990, respectively. In between he has been the Vice President of Research in Memco Software and a co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Girafa.com.

Yuval's research explores the security of the interface between the software and the hardware. In particular, he is interested in the discrepancy between the way that programmers think about software execution and the concrete execution in modern processors. He works on identifying micro-architectural vulnerabilities, and on exploitation and mitigation techniques.