ENGG 5383 Applied Cryptography (Fall 2018)

Next edition: Fall 2020, Th 12:30PM - 1:15PM, Fr 1:30PM - 3:15PM
Venue: Online (The Zoom link will be availale soon)

Thanks for the initial support. We reached the capacity. I suppose there would be vacancy later for those who are really interested.
Consider you are confessing your love, how can you sign a love letter such that only your crush knows it is from you, yet no one else will be convinced? Cryptography can help in achieving these seemingly conflicting goals. It is not just about ensuring you are browsing a legitimate shopping website and no one else can see your credit card number. It is an inter-disciplinary subject with applications ranging from secure routing to anonymous reputation systems. You will understand the magic under the hood of currently deployed systems. Special topics include privacy-enhancing cryptography and searchable encryption.

This is a graduate-level class, yet undergraduate and MSc students are also welcomed.
For the past 4 editions, we had a mixture of Undergraduates, PhD students from IE, PhD students from other departments and/or universities, as well as exchange students from overseas.

Class population: BEng(IE), BSc(CS), MSc(IE), PhD(IE), PhD(CSE), Exchange Student

Students who have taken IERG4130, other CSCI, ECLT, IEMS courses on cryptography can also take this class.
(The exclusion of CSCI5470/ENGG5105 is obsolete.)

Workload:

  1. 2 Assignments [check blackboard]
  2. Mid-Term (Open-Note) x 1
  3. Project with Presentation x 1 & Report x 1
Updated Syllabus (Chinese Version)

This is a graduate-level course on cryptography. It focuses on the definitions and constructions of various cryptographic schemes and protocols, as well as their applications.
Useful tools for securing practical systems and emerging techniques in the applied research community will be introduced.
No prior knowledge of security, cryptography, or number theory is required.

Upon successful completion of the course, the students will have acquired the ability to:
  1. demonstrate knowledge and understanding of essential concepts, methods, and technologies of cryptography
  2. understand various cryptographic primitives, their security properties, and applications
  3. apply cryptographic techniques to various security designs, both practical and theoretical
  4. demonstrate awareness in latest advances in the field and what are possible to achieve with cryptography
Lecture Slides (slides will be moved to blackboard after add-drop period):
  1. 03/09: Course Logistics, Some Movitating Applications
  2. 04/09: Introduction
  3. 10/09: Introduction (cont.), 11/09: Encryption
  4. 17/09: [Typhoon], 18/09 (11:30am:2-15pm): Encryption, Public-Key Cryptography
  5. 24/09: Tutorial Notes 1, 25/09: [Holiday]
  6. 01/10: [Holiday] 02/10: Public-Key Crypt ography (cont.)
    [Assignment 1 released]
  7. 08/10, 09/10: Public-Key Cryptography (cont.)
  8. 15/10, 16/10: Security Proof and Random Oracle Model
  9. 22/10, 23/10: Zero-Knowledge Proof and Applications
    [Assignment 2 released]
  10. 29/10, 30/10: ZKP and App. (cont.), Functional Encryption
  11. 05/11: FE (cont.)
    06/11: [Mid-Term Examination]
  12. 12/11: Pairing-Based Encryption
    13/11: Pairing-Based Signatures
  13. 19/11: Can you find the one for me? (Guest Presentation by Dr. Yongjun Zhao)
    20/11: Related Key Attack and Leakage Resilient Cryptography (Guest Presentation by Dr. Tsz Hon Yuen)
  14. 26/11: Simple Password-Hardened Encryption Services
    27/11: Searchable Encryption; Wrapping up
  15. 18/12: [Project Presentation Day-I]
    19/12: [Project Presentation Day-II]
    20/12: [Project Presentation Day-III]
    29/12: [Project Report Due-Date]
Project Presentations (2018)
Links: Standard stuff: