INTRODUCTION TO CRYPTOGRAPHY

Prerequisites & course information

Requisites: ( MATH 320 , 340 , 341 , 345 , or 375 ), graduate/professional standing, or declared in Mathematics VISP (undergraduate or graduate) Course Designation: Core GenEd - Mathematics & Quantitative Reasoning Level - Advanced L&S Credit - L&S Liberal Arts and Science Repeatable for Credit: No Last Taught: Fall 2026 Learning Outcomes: 1. Describe and distinguish between perfect secrecy and computational security. Audience: Undergraduate 2. State game‐based security definitions—IND‐CPA, IND‐CCA, MAC unforgeability, and signature unforgeability—in both symmetric‐ and public‐key contexts. Audience: Undergraduate 3. Explain core primitives: pseudorandom functions, block ciphers, and collision‐resistant hash functions. Audience: Undergraduate 4. Contrast foundational hardness assumptions: one‐way functions, PRFs, Diffie–Hellman, discrete logarithm, and integer factoring. Audience: Undergraduate 5. Construct symmetric and public‐key encryption and authentication schemes using these primitives, and prove their security. Audience: Undergraduate 6. Evaluate the security and deployment trade‐offs of protocols such as authenticated encryption, key exchange, and digital signatures. Audience: Undergraduate Learning Outcomes: 1. Describe and distinguish between perfect secrecy and computational security. Audience: Undergraduate 2. State game‐based security definitions—IND‐CPA, IND‐CCA, MAC unforgeability, and signature unforgeability—in both symmetric‐ and public‐key contexts. Audience: Undergraduate 3. Explain core primitives: pseudorandom functions, block ciphers, and collision‐resistant hash functions. Audience: Undergraduate 4. Contrast foundational hardness assumptions: one‐way functions, PRFs, Diffie–Hellman, discrete logarithm, and integer factoring. Audience: Undergraduate 5. Construct symmetric and public‐key encryption and authentication schemes using these primitives, and prove their security. Audience: Undergraduate 6. Evaluate the security and deployment trade‐offs of protocols such as authenticated encryption, key exchange, and digital signatures. Audience: Undergraduate