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CS 127/227 / CSCI E-127

If you are considering taking this course, you should: (1) Read the FAQ and the syllabus (2) Do Homework Zero (pdf, markdown , LaTeX ). I recommend you do it before the first lecture and in any case you will need to submit it by Thursday September 9 2021 at midnight through gradescope. (3) As part of homework zero you will need to read the “mathematical background” and “introduction” lecture of lecture notes and will need to annotate the latter on Perusall - you can join it through canvas. (4) You can join the Ed Discussion Board for this course through canvas.

Cryptography is as old as human communication itself, but has undergone a revolution in the last few decades. It is now about much more than “secret writing” and includes seemingly paradoxical notions such as communicating securely without a shared secret, and computing on encrypted data. In this challenging but rewarding course we will start from the basics of private and public key cryptography and go all the way up to advanced notions such as fully homomorphic encryption, and indistinguishability obfuscation.

Mathematical background: This is a proof-based course that will be best appreciated by mathematically mature students, see the FAQ. I highly recommend you go over my CS 121 lectures on mathematical background and probability before the course starts. All students should complete homework zero before the course begins and in any case no later than midnight of the second lecture.

The graduate version of this course, CS-227, will involve an extra project and scribe notes.

Some information from prior iterations of the course

See also here

This course has lecture notes but no official textbook. However, the following books can be helpful: