What methods would you like to use to achieve better cybersecurity?
Let’s take a message sent from person A to person B as an example. If person A and person B use an app that has no security measures in place, it is possible that someone is virtually looking over their shoulders and reading the text. I am working on technologies that encrypt the message and decrypt it again at the end so that only the intended recipient can read it. Cryptography is a fundamental mechanism in many areas today, not only to protect the privacy of our communications, but also to protect sensitive areas such as online banking, electronic health records or online tax returns in secure environments. Companies and government institutions also need secure systems.However, the effort required for encryption and decryption means additional computing power. Does cryptography necessarily make our systems slower?
Basically, the principle that stronger security is linked to more computing power is correct. It is important to find a balance between the security requirements and the effort involved. If cybersecurity measures make systems too slow, too cumbersome or too resource-intensive, users will often bypass them. In our research, we therefore strive to ensure that a cryptographic code achieves three goals: it should be correct, efficient and maintainable
What does that mean in concrete terms?
Basically, the code must deliver correct results: one plus one must equal two and not three. Otherwise it is not secure. In addition, the code must not impair the general performance of a system. We also have the challenge of maintenance: today, we want to make very different systems secure - from large servers to small devices such as pedometers. It should be possible to integrate a cryptographic code on several devices using simple methods. It should also be possible to integrate the technology into devices that will only be developed in the futureCan you explain your approach in more detail? How do you improve the cryptographic code?
We specify the possible arithmetic operations ourselves at the beginning and then we determine which changes should be possible in the code. We then leave it to the computer to try out the various combinations and search for an optimal algorithm. In a joint research project that I was involved in as part of my work at the University of Melbourne, we developed a cryptographic code optimizer called CryptOpt that can automatically generate codes for different devices. The code adapts incrementally, measuring performance and gradually arriving at the best variant it can achieve. This system delivers competitive results compared to the results achieved by experts when optimizing the code manually. Researchers at the University of Adelaide, Monash University, Ruhr University Bochum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University and the Georgia Institute of Technology have collaborated on the project. CryptOpt is an open source project that aims to enable anyone, even non-specialized IT technicians, to create optimized cryptographic code for their systems.In open source projects, all information is usually publicly and transparently accessible. What if hackers also make use of it?
This project is about optimizing cryptographic code. If a hacker uses it to break a cryptosystem, that’s another story.
Finally, can I ask you how careful you are about the security of your own data?
I would say that I make every effort to protect sensitive information as well as possible. But of course there are limitations: While I would like to have the highest possible security, I also have the need to communicate online and use applications. I try to find a balance here too. In my community, this is not so difficult, at least when it comes to messengers - researchers in cybersecurity have similar needs and tend to use those services that are more secure.
Chitchanok Chuengsatiansup has been a professor at the Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Cybersecurity since November 2024. Prior to that, she was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Melbourne and a Lecturer at the University of Adelaide in Australia. After completing her PhD at Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands, she worked in France at INRIA and ENS de Lyon. She completed her bachelor’s degree at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand, followed by a master’s degree at the University of Tokyo in Japan. Her research aims to improve the security and efficiency of cryptographic systems. In particular, she focuses on optimizing interrelated factors to develop highly secure cryptographic software that works fast at the same time.
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