UMBC talk 10/20: Diffie on "Key Escrow, Privacy, and Good Business"

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

                    Distinguished Lecture Series
                              sponsored by
                                    
                   The Department of Computer Science
                 The Department of Information Systems
          The Maryland Center for Telecommunications Research
                                    
                University of Maryland Baltimore County
                                    
                                    
                                    
                 KEY ESCROW, PRIVACY, AND GOOD BUSINESS
                                    
                                    
                            WHITFIELD DIFFIE
                            SUN MICROSYSTEMS
                                    


The U.S. Federal Government is pushing a plan to adopt a federal
standard cryptographic system whose workings are secret and which
enables the government to read messages whenever it considers this
necessary.


We will examine the implications not only for personal privacy, but for
the future of the American computer and communications industries in a
global economy in which no country is any longer big enough to dictate
the rules.


                                -- o --


Whitfield Diffie, who holds the position of Distinguished Engineer at
Sun Microsystems, is best known for his 1975 discovery of the concept of
public key cryptography, for which he was recently awarded a Doctorate
in Technical Sciences (Honoris Causa) by the Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology.


For a dozen years prior to assuming his present position in 1991, Diffie
was Manager of Secure Systems Research for Northern Telecom, functioning
as the center of expertise in advanced security technologies throughout
the corporation.  Among his achievements in this position was the design
of the key management architecture for NT's recently released PDSO
security system for X.25 packet networks.


Diffie received a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1965.  Prior to becoming
interested in cryptography, he worked on the development of the Mathlab
symbolic manipulation system --- sponsored jointly at Mitre and the MIT
Artificial Intelligence Laboratory --- and later on proof of correctness
of computer programs at Stanford University.  He is the recipient of the
IEEE Information Theory Society Best Paper Award for 1979 and the IEEE
Donald E. Fink award for 1981.
                                    
                                    
                                    
                   1:00pm Wednesday, October 20, 1993
                             Lecture Hall 5
               Engineering and Computer Science Building
                University of Maryland Baltimore County
                           Baltimore Maryland
                                    
            coffee and discussion  2:00pm-3:00pm in ECS 210I
                                    
   For additional information, contact Angie Silanskis, 410-455-3000.