Germany has agreed to stop ChatControl for now, due to huge amounts of public pressure. Good job! The bad news is that it could come back as soon as December, and the German government has interpreted the feedback as a need to “moderate” the proposal.

Discord user IDs getting leaked is the entirely predictable consequence of requiring platforms to do age verification. That data never goes away, it spreads. In this case, into appeals in a breached customer support database. And predictably, it can get worse. www.404media.co/the-discord-...

Someone please make me understand how Denmark can be at the same time freaking out about hybrid war with Russia AND pushing for government-mandated spyware as Chat Control.

What is chat control? Good video explainer developed by @carmelatroncoso.bsky.social and team at Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy #chatcontrol www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y2O...

We are alarmed by reports that Germany is on the verge of a catastrophic about-face, reversing its longstanding and principled opposition to the EU’s Chat Control proposal which, if passed, could spell the end of the right to privacy in Europe. signal.org/blog/pdfs/ge...

Olingo: Threshold Lattice Signatures with DKG and Identifiable Abort (Kamil Doruk Gur, Patrick Hough, Jonathan Katz, Caroline Sandsbråten, Tjerand Silde) ia.cr/2025/1789

In 2023, Signal was the first mainstream messenger to enable post-quantum cryptography. We’re still ahead of the (elliptical) curve, implementing a new hybrid PQ ratchet ensuring Forward Secrecy & Post-Compromise Security even in a post-quantum world. signal.org/blog/spqr/

Burn it with fire

Ah ja hvorfor satse på personvernvennlige nettsider med riktig informasjon når man heller kan samle persondata via en tjeneste som tar feil iblant FOR FUCKS SAKE STATEN dere -kan- ikke være så cucked www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/o...

More than 500 researchers have signed an open letter against the dangerous EU proposal on chat control. The proposal remains ineffective, undoes decades of results in E2E encryption, and threatens the privacy of half a billion citizens. csa-scientist-open-letter.org/Sep2025

The EU Parliament has published a new proposal for Chat Control to mass-surveil all digital communication in Europe. The proposal is ineffective, weakens secure communication, and violates basic human privacy. This must be stopped immediately. #ChatControl csa-scientist-open-letter.org/Sep2025

Accepted papers at IACR Asiacrypt 2025 are now available online (not a complete list yet): iacr.org/cryptodb/dat...

EU is demanding that every site use age verification technology, while insisting it do things it cannot do, and behave in a manner it cannot behave. This is not policy making. This is wishful thinking, with a side of "we'll just blame the tech companies for not waving their magic wand."

We've published Volume 2, Issue 2 of IACR Communications in Cryptology. This now brings us over 200 articles published in six issues. cic.iacr.org/i/2/2 It may be time to overhaul the rest of IACR publishing. 🤔

White text on white background instructing LLMs to give positive reviews is apparently now common enough to show up in searches for boilerplate text.

This battle will keep playing out over and over again until they achieve something that their own citizens have made it clear they don’t want. www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-priv...

Well, this horrible idea refuses to die so we should refuse to let it pass and start organizing again. ec.europa.eu/commission/p...

An out-of-schedule update to my quantum landscape chart: sam-jaques.appspot.com/quantum_land..., prompted by @craiggidney.bsky.social 's new paper: arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917. A startling jump (20x) in how easy quantum factoring can be! Also: much improved web design!

Congratulations to the new IACR fellows.... Joan Daemen, Thomas Johansson, Anna Lysyanskaya, Pascal Paillier, J.R. Rao, Alon Rosen, Elaine Shi, Bo-Yin Yang. iacr.org/fellows/ #cryptography

The problem with most machine-based random number generators is that they’re not TRULY random, so if you need genuine randomness it is sometimes necessary to link your code to an external random process like a physical noise source or the current rate of US tariffs on a given country.

Volume 2 Issue 1 of the IACR's Diamond Open Access journal Communications in Cryptology is out... cic.iacr.org/i/2/1

"Rethinking Security from the Ground Up" an interview with @rikkebjerg.bsky.social (based in @isg-rhul.bsky.social) in @themarkup.org It's a good interview, go read it. themarkup.org/hello-world/...

IACR Public Key Cryptography 2025 registration is open! Please check out pkc.iacr.org/2025/registr... to attend the conference in Røros, Norway from May 12 to 15 🤩 @bordekock.bsky.social , @tiborj.bsky.social

An intro to lattice crypto and the published NIST standards for non-cryptographers who find themselves involved in the PQ transition. Thanks to @cryptojedi.bsky.social for the assist :) blog.cloudflare.com/lattice-cryp...

🔐✌️ Victory for Privacy and Security in France 🇫🇷 End-to-end encryption will continue to be available in France, as the assembly overwhelmingly voted against an amendment to legislation fighting drug trafficking which required backdoors in encrypted messengers. www.lemonde.fr/societe/arti...

Update on crypto.iacr.org/2025/

We have extended the submission deadline for the International Workshop on Foundations and Applications of Privacy-Enhancing Cryptography (PrivCrypt) by two weeks to April 4, 2025, AoE. Please help spread the word and consider submitting your work to join us in Munich in Summer 😎

❗️The #PKC 2025 program is out: there are 3 accepted COSIC papers! These papers will be presented from May 12-15 in Røros, Norway pkc.iacr.org/2025/program...

The list of accepted papers and the (preliminary) program for PKC 2025 are now available online: pkc.iacr.org/2025/program... We are also delighted to announce that Jesper Buus Nielsen has accepted our invitation to give an invited talk at PKC 2025! See you at PKC 2025!

Some (there will be 60) accepted papers for IACR PKC 2025 are now available online: iacr.org/cryptodb/dat...

Accepted papers for IACR Eurocrypt 2025 are now available online: iacr.org/cryptodb/dat...

New public statement from Apple: “As of Friday, February 21, Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection as a feature to new users in the UK.”

The tentative program for Real World Crypto 2025 is live! rwc.iacr.org/2025/program... A huge thanks to my co-chair @malb.bsky.social and all the amazing program committee members for helping put this together. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone in Sofia! #realworldcrypto

Following up on the recent news about the U.K. government attempting to force Apple to backdoor its cloud encryption, @stamos.org and I wrote this op-ed in the WSJ. www.wsj.com/opinion/u-k-...

New: The UK's secret order demanding Apple allows access to the cloud-stored encrypted data of any customer anywhere in the world is an "emergency," per critics. The order also sets a dangerous precedent that may embolden authoritarian regimes to demand similar access. techcrunch.com/2025/02/10/u...

Without setting out to do so, Andrew Krapivin recently upended the common thinking around hash tables — one of the best-studied tools in computer science. Steve Nadis reports: www.quantamagazine.org/undergraduat...

en vanlig mandag i 2025

We are organising the International Workshop on Foundations and Applications of Privacy-Enhancing Cryptography (PrivCrypt) - co-located with ACNS 2025 end of June in beautiful Munich. Submission deadline is March 21, 2025 (AoE). Please help spread the word! 🙏 privcryptworkshop.github.io

We're hiring multiple PhD candidates for our ARC-funded project on fully-homomorphic encryption (FHE), SNARKs & more Job listing 👇 iacr.org/jobs/item/3840 Apply via docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... Some info on PhD at Monash/in Australia mfesgin.github.io/supervision/ Please help to share!

I wrote a post about how AI will interface with end-to-end encryption. TL;DR maybe not so well! blog.cryptographyengineering.com/2025/01/17/l...

Excited to announce a funded PhD position analysing the Social Foundations of Cryptography here at King's College London with me and @malb.bsky.social . Applications open now, feel free to reach out for a chat. social-foundations-of-cryptography.gitlab.io Link in next post!

We are hiring a PhD student to work on applied cryptographic protocol design at Aarhus University: phd.nat.au.dk/for-applican...

Jeg skrev denne før M-Zucks seneste, men la gå, for dette mener jeg sterkt: «Zuckerberg fremstår i det hele tatt stadig mer som sin egen «failson» – den mindre talentfulle etterkommeren etter hans tidligere jeg, hvis ene gode idé genererer nok inntekt til at han kan leve på den resten av livet.»

Khanh and Eamonn are organising UK Crypto Day on 20 February at King's College London. Registration is free (and open) but required: uk-crypto-day.github.io/2025/02/20/u... Help us spread the word and see you there.

Honestly, the Let's Encrypt folks don't get nearly enough credit for basically protecting the entire fucking internet, by making it absolute bog standard to encrypt everything. It happened so fast and so many people were skeptical.

Lot meg begeistre av Willow, og så måtte jeg også tygge litt på HVORFOR jeg lot meg begeistre av Willow. Bonus: Hvor kompliserte ting gir det mening å forklare i lydformat? Har muligens den grensen i bakspeilet her.

"This was the last meeting of 2025!,” I was about to post, rejoicing, smiling – happy. Then, I checked my emails. Thanks for the calendar invite.