Envisioning the Future of NextGen Networked Systems and Digital Signatures

Webinar Title: Envisioning the Future of NextGen Networked Systems and Digital Signatures Speaker: Attila Yavuz, Associate Professor at University of South Florida

RSVP: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/95a7fbe8-e8a5-4267-a3e1-657860377849@180d43c5-5231-41af-9aa7-e6636b7c1bdf

Abstract: Authentication and integrity are foundational security services for trustworthy systems and the prerequisite of privacy preservation. At the heart of these services lies digital signatures, widely deployed in real-life applications and supported by various standards. Yet, newly emerging next-generation (NextG) networked systems are vastly distributed, include many resource-limited components, and demand advanced features such as privacy, anonymity, and post-quantum (PQ) security. However, the current signature standards and specialized signatures only meet some of these important requirements in isolation.

In this talk, we discuss how to mitigate this gap by uniting burgeoning ubiquitous systems with advancements in digital signatures and then envisioning the trust via signatures with extended features for NextG networked systems. We investigate the current signature standardizations and advanced constructions for their potential and drawbacks in three essential aspects of NextG networks - decentralized, privacy-preserving, and resource-constraint settings. We first analyze threshold cryptography efforts proffered by NIST, both from secure multi-party computation and custom design constructions, with applications on distributed systems like blockchains, federated cloud, and NextG Public Key Infrastructures (PKIs) in mind. We then investigate the intersections of distributed signatures and privacy-preservation techniques for privacy-sensitive NextG applications (e.g., medical, cryptocurrency). We also focus on research gaps for resource and time-limited systems and identify suitable signatures to remedy this gap for security-critical applications (e.g., vehicular networks, smart grids). Finally, we discuss potential directions for these ubiquitous NextG systems and advanced signatures in the PQ era.

Speaker's Bio: Dr. Attila Altay Yavuz is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and the Director of the Applied Cryptography Research Laboratory at the University of South Florida (USF). He was an Assistant Professor in the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, at Oregon State University (2014-2018) and in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, at USF (2018-June 2021). He was a member of the security and privacy research group at the Robert Bosch Research and Technology Center North America (2011-2014). He received his Ph.D. degree in Computer Science from North Carolina State University (2011). He received his MS degree in Computer Science from Bogazici University (2006) in Istanbul, Turkey. He is broadly interested in the design, analysis, and application of cryptographic tools and protocols to enhance the security of computer systems. Attila Altay Yavuz is a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award, Cisco Research Award (thrice - 2019,2020,2022), unrestricted research gifts from Robert Bosch (five times), USF Faculty Outstanding Research Achievement Award, USF Excellence in Innovation Award, and USF College of Engineering’s Outstanding Research Achievement Award. His research on privacy-enhancing technologies and intra-vehicular network security is in the process of technology transfer with potential worldwide deployments. He has authored more than 95 products including research articles in top conferences, journals, and patents. He is a senior member of IEEE.