Secrets and Promises: A Course on Cryptography for Nonmajors

秘密与承诺：非专业密码学课程

• 批准号: 9555081
• 负责人: Philip Klein
• 金额: $ 5.63万
• 依托单位: Brown University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1996
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1996-01-01 至 1998-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9555081&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Secrets; Promises; Course; Cryptography; Nonmajors

This project proposes to design and teach a course on modern techniques for cryptographic protocols and their ramifications. The course would be accessible to students with no special mathematical background or talent. The primary goal of the course is to expose students to fundamental concepts in mathematics and theoretical computer science, using cryptography as a vehicle. A second goal is to give students a background in an area that will be increasingly important as use of the Internet grows and as our economy becomes more heavily based on trade in information (including software, audio, video and film, marketing data, etc.). Finally, the potential for widespread use of cryptography and digital signatures brings into focus such controversial and important issues as the conflict between privacy and law enforcement; the course would provide a forum for discussion of such issues. The intention is that the course would serve both to educate non-science majors and to attract prospective majors to the sciences. Because there is currently no textbook that addresses the subject at a level accessible to students that are not mathematically oriented, this project will develop suitable course materials. Such materials include course notes and homework assignments. In addition, the PI will develop a small programming language and visual environment in which even a novice programmer can develop and experiment with cryptographic protocols. As part of the course, students will have "lab assignments" in which they are led through such experimentation. The PI wil make the course materials, the programming language and environment, and the lab assignments widely available to prospective teachers of similar courses at other colleges.

本计画拟设计并教授一门有关密码协定及其衍生物之现代技术课程。该课程适合没有特殊数学背景或天赋的学生。该课程的主要目标是让学生接触数学和理论计算机科学的基本概念，使用密码学作为载体。第二个目标是让学生了解一个随着互联网使用的增长和我们的经济越来越依赖信息贸易（包括软件、音频、视频和电影、营销数据等）而变得越来越重要的领域的背景。最后，密码学和数字签字广泛使用的可能性使人们注意到诸如隐私与执法之间的冲突等有争议的重要问题;培训班将为讨论这些问题提供一个论坛。其目的是，这门课程既要教育非理科专业的学生，又要吸引未来的理科专业学生。 由于目前还没有一本教科书能够让不懂数学的学生理解这一主题，因此本项目将编写适当的教材。这些材料包括课程笔记和家庭作业。此外，PI将开发一个小型编程语言和可视化环境，即使是新手程序员也可以在其中开发和实验加密协议。作为课程的一部分，学生将有“实验作业”，他们通过这样的实验领导。PI将使课程材料，编程语言和环境，以及实验室作业广泛提供给其他学院类似课程的潜在教师。