290G - Introduction to Modern Cryptography

This class is a self-contained graduate-level introduction to cryptography. We will study tools and techniques to design systems with provable security guarantees. The focus will be on learning rigorous foundations (what is cryptographic security? how is it formalized?) as well as basic cryptographic algorithms for several tasks.

Topics will include: Cryptographic pseudorandomness, secret-key encryption, message authentication, key agreement, public-key encryption, digital signatures, identity-based encryption, and cryptographic protocols (commitments, oblivious transfer, zero knowledge, and two-party computation). Time permitting, we will also move to some advanced topics like fully-homomorphic and functional encryption.