Let's talk about cyber security

As cyber security becomes a hot topic globally, Deakin University Thinker-in-Residence Professor Yuliang Zheng will deliver a timely public talk titled Standardisation and Commercialisation of Cyber Security Technology this month.

Professor Zheng, from the Department of Software and Information Systems at UNC Charlotte, is known as the father of signcryption technology which is now an international standard for data security.

His pioneering research into immunising public key encryption against adaptive attacks has been embodied in numerous international standards for public key cryptography, including those from ISO, IEEE and IETF.

An internationally recognised authority in cryptography and network security, Professor Zheng has published over 200 scholarly articles and books on security and holds many patents in cyber security.

He plays an active leadership role in international research communities, serving as the Chair of the Steering Committee of the Public Key Cryptography (PKC) conferences sponsored by the International Association for Cryptologic Research.

"The life cycle of cyber security research encompasses a series of successive intellectual and entrepreneurial endeavours," Professor Zheng said.

"This life cycle starts out identifying a cyber security problem, followed by securing research funds, producing desired solutions to the problem, applying for patent protection of research outcomes, disseminating the research outcomes either at a conference or in a scholarly journal, commercialising unique techniques discovered during the work, and  pushing the techniques into national and/or international standards to maximise their impact.

"While competitive economies strive to excel in all the stages of the life cycle, a leading economy tends to stand out for its ability to complete the final stages of the life cycle,  namely to protect intellectual property rights and to commercialise and standardise the solutions developed.

"The main goal of this first public talk is to share my personal experience in commercialising and standardising scholarly research.

"I will focus in particular on two data security techniques I have developed.

"The first is the signcryption algorithm that 'hits two birds with one stone' - it protects both authenticity and confidentiality of data with a significantly smaller overhead than providing these features separately.

"During 2008-2011, I was invited by the International Standardisation Organization (ISO) to help standardise the signcryption algorithm. I believe that my experience in turning a 'textbook' algorithm into a practical technology for wide-spread applications in the real world would be beneficial to other researchers who wish to go an extra mile to push their scholarly research into practice.

"The second technique is an Internet scale network defense system called  the Internet Defense Force (IDF). The genesis of IDF was my realisation that cyber space evolved in a way that was reminiscent of the development of civilisation and its defense.

"I will share my experience in commercialisation both at a personal level and also provide my observations on institutional support for technology spin-offs."

Details:

Wednesday 26 June 2013
Deakin's Melbourne City Centre Conference Room
Level 3, 550 Bourke Street

11.30AM to 1.30PM.

For further information: Ms Judy Chow (jchow@deakin.edu.au)