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Ask HN: Best book on modern cryptography?
For self learning, approachable etc ... any suggestions ?
- sifar 4y agoAny suggestion for a good book(s) to study and understand Homomorphic encryption ? I prefer a book format and haven't yet come across a good one on this topic yet.
- pyb 4y agoIs there a general cryptography text that also covers zero-knowledge proofs, etc?
- shishy 4y agohttps://www.manning.com/books/real-world-cryptography https://www.manning.com/books/real-world-cryptography https://www.amazon.com/dp/3642041000?tag=readthistwice-20&linkCode=ogi&th=1&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/dp/3642041000?tag=readthistwice-20&li... -- along with his YouTube course: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1usFRN4LCMcfIV7UjHNuQg https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1usFRN4LCMcfIV7UjHNuQg
- obeliskora 4y agoReal world cryptography is great
- chollida1 4y agoUnderstanding cryptography is good https://www.amazon.com/dp/3642041000 https://www.amazon.com/dp/3642041000
- hangonhn 4y agoSerious Cryptography https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593278268/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593278268/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b... It's quite accessible for non-math majors and includes source code. It seems to have been written with software engineers in mind. The formatting of the source code in Kindle isn't great but otherwise the book is excellent and balances between "cookbook" and "graduate level textbook". The author is also quite reputable having designed BLAKE2.
- wepple 4y ago+1 on this, it hits the right spot between being not too mathy/theoretical but going sufficiently deep for most engineers. It’s probably the right book for anyone who needs to learn more about crypto but isn’t planning to become a full time cryptographer
- qorrect 4y agoThis sounds perfect thank you.
- c0742e9366 4y agoFor a rigorous, yet accessible and rather in-depth introduction to modern, provable cryptography I would recommend "Introduction to Modern Cryptography" by Katz & Lindell. It starts from the basics, the proofs are thoroughly elaborated and it has an appendix covering the necessary math prerequisites.
- WheelsAtLarge 4y agoA fun book to read is "The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography" It's a fast read and it gives a brief history of cypher tech over time.
- qorrect 4y agoI'm excited to read this! This isn't about cryptography but Code by Charles Petzold is also a fun book ( vaguely ) about information theory.
- dharmab 4y agoI read this in the 4th grade and it changed the course of my life. It explains everything up to RSA with math that a middle schooler can follow, with exciting stories of cryptography and linguistics across history. Lots of cool spy stories!
- rfd4sgmk8u 4y agoI read it in high school and would agree, it got me really excited about cryptography and espionage throughout history, no undoubtedly helped me discover infosec and cryptography. I saw Simon Singh present an another launch later, very inspiring author.
- snarkypixel 4y agoOne of my favorite book
- vmurthy 4y agoLol. I’ve read part of this book but didn’t see the full title. This is a book by Simon Singh. https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/aw/d/0385495323/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr= https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/aw/d/0385495323/ref=tmm_pap_swa... Check out his other book - Fermat’s Last Theorem
- albert_e 4y agoThis is a great book indeed. I recommend this too as well as other books by the same author for popsci fans - Fermat's Last Theorem, Big Bang.
- barathr 4y agoCryptography Engineering Design Principles and Practical Applications: https://www.schneier.com/books/cryptography-engineering/ https://www.schneier.com/books/cryptography-engineering/ They cover the fundamentals from a practical engineering perspective. After reading it you can then pop up a level and read specs to understand specific deployed protocols (e.g. TLS) or down a level and read the details of individual cryptographic primitives / constructions.
- solomatov 4y agoA good option might be: http://toc.cryptobook.us/ http://toc.cryptobook.us/ It's a book co-authored by Dan Boneh, who's a professor from Stanfrod working on Crypto, and Blockchain. It's a huge book, but there's a lot of interesting stuff in there.
- vector_spaces 4y agoTo piggy back on this thread, can anyone recommend a book on cryptography for mathematicians? I'm familiar with some of the more popular applied books, but I'm also interested in more rigorous texts that use careful proofs and state theorems etc.
- c0742e9366 4y agoAs written below, "Introduction to Modern Cryptography" by Katz & Lindell. Another option would be "A Graduate Course in Applied Cryptography" by Boneh & Shoup. However, for starting out, I would definitely recommend the former as it's more polished and focuses on the essentials.
- buescher 4y agoI took Boneh's graduate class a few years ago through SCPD. Recommended if you can justify it. He has a Coursera course that I assume is of similar high quality with less depth and rigor. We used the above two books in addition to Handbook of Applied Cryptography by Alfred J. Menezes, Paul C. van Oorschot and Scott A. Vanstone. I notice Boneh no longer uses the latter for CS255; perhaps it is too out of date now? At any rate, it is also available free on the web: https://cacr.uwaterloo.ca/hac/ https://cacr.uwaterloo.ca/hac/
- sweis 4y agoOded Goldreich's "Foundations of Cryptography" books are the rigorous, theoretical oriented books used in many grad-level crypto courses: https://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~oded/foc-book.html https://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~oded/foc-book.html Neil Koblitz has "A Course in Number Theory and Cryptography", which I haven't read, but is often used: https://www.amazon.com/Course-Number-Cryptography-Graduate-Mathematics/dp/0387942939 https://www.amazon.com/Course-Number-Cryptography-Graduate-M... Also, Boneh and Shoup is good and mentioned in other comments: https://toc.cryptobook.us/ https://toc.cryptobook.us/
- ngneer 4y agoCryptography: Theory and Practice, Third Edition by Douglas R. Stinson
- elijahvoigt 4y agoJoy of Cryptography by Mike Rosulek is my favorite: https://joyofcryptography.com/ https://joyofcryptography.com/ Written by a past professor of mine. Grounded in a lot of math, but not intimidating.
- quesera 4y agoI vouched for your comment, because it seems earnest but was marked dead. I don't see anything in your comment history to indicate that you are shadowbanned. I have not read the book, except to verify that it was real and looked plausible. If your comment was downvoted for content, I hope people will comment instead.
- captn3m0 4y agoCan vouch for the book, and while I haven’t finished it yet - it is well written.
- throwaway0x7E6 4y agoWilliam Easttom - Modern Cryptography Applied Mathematics for Encryption and Information Security https://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=B5DB9B050F1044082F9ED26411AFC68B https://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=B5DB9B050F1044082F9ED26...
- tptacek 4y agoDavid Wong's _Real World Cryptography_: https://www.manning.com/books/real-world-cryptography https://www.manning.com/books/real-world-cryptography Jean-Philippe Aumasson's _Serious Cryptography_: https://nostarch.com/seriouscrypto https://nostarch.com/seriouscrypto Ferguson and Schneier's _Cryptography Engineering_: https://www.amazon.com/Cryptography-Engineering-Principles-Practical-Applications/dp/0470474246 https://www.amazon.com/Cryptography-Engineering-Principles-P... --- dated, a little wrong about some things, but not insane (like _Applied Cryptography_ is). Hoffman, Pipher, and Silverman's _Introduction to Mathematical Cryptography_: https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Mathematical-Cryptography-Undergraduate-Mathematics/dp/1441926747 https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Mathematical-Cryptograph... --- a good first step into theoretical cryptography.
- muggermuch 4y ago>> dated, a little wrong about some things, but not insane (like _Applied Cryptography_ is). Why is "Applied Cryptography" insane? As an interested bystander, I'm curious to know more.
- pvg 4y agoYou can get multiple seasons of this clip show by putting 'author:tptacek applied cryptography' in the search box. A recent episode: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28923954 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28923954
- tptacek 4y agoYoink! https://sockpuppet.org/blog/2013/07/22/applied-practical-cryptography/ https://sockpuppet.org/blog/2013/07/22/applied-practical-cry...
- rstuart4133 4y agoYou have to actually read all of _Applied Cryptography_ before it becomes obvious what the central theme is. Its a big book, but unlike other may big computer books over the years it isn't padded. It's literally a compendium of crypto. Including all the failed crypto. By the end of it, you've got used to reading the (usually very impressive) credentials of the researchers, and through explanation of what they did, and then how it all fell apart after a few years of attacks. If read about how people far clever than you got it wrong over and over again, it is near impossible to come away without the impression "here be dragons - really big and mean ones", and the corollary "don't even think of trying to do this stuff yourself - just stuff on the shelf that has been proven over time".
- aildours 4y agoHere are some books that I've read with some remarks which you may find useful. - "Cryptography: A Very Short Introduction" by Piper and Murphy - This is a book in the Very Short Introduction series, so is a bit light on the math. If that's what you are looking for though, this is a good resource. - "Cryptography Made Simple" by Nigel Smart - The choice of topics is quite eclectic (in the best way possible!). For ex. it is the first general crypto book I've read which talks about lattices (most post-quantum world crypto schemes are lattice based) and things like commitments and zero-knowledge proofs. Develops just the right amount of math to talk about a lot of different things. - "Cryptography: Theory and Practice" by Stinson and Paterson - adequate, covers the usual topics (plus a chapter on post-quantum crypto). - "Introduction to Modern Cryptography" by Katz and Lindell - basically a reference for the theory side of crypto. Quite math heavy (or to be more accurate, notation heavy, like theoretical crypto tends to be). - "Real-World Cryptography" by David Wong - I have not read another crypto book which tackles as many topics, it has chapters on e2e encryption, cryptocurrency and hardware crypto. Is a bit too hand-wavey and doesn't properly explain the math sometimes, but it is great for self-learners and people who are looking for a book on topics not covered in other books. - "Serious Cryptography" by Jean-Philippe Aumasson - from the No Starch Press stable. The exposition is quite good, and finds a decent balance between making it approachable and getting the details right. - "Understanding Cryptography" by Paar and Pelzl - decent coverage of fundamental primitives (block/stream ciphers, public key encryption, hashes, signatures etc) but feels a bit outdated. For ex. there is a whole chapter on DES.
- papmarcin 4y agohttps://cryptohack.org/ https://cryptohack.org/
- dontbenebby 4y agoFor self learning, do this: https://inventwithpython.com/cracking/ https://inventwithpython.com/cracking/ Do the exericses. Learn the logic, don't get lost in learning C, you'll go crazy. Learn C or whatever when you learn exploit development. Crypto and exploits are two very different things.
- throwaway81523 4y agoI still like Bellare and Rogaway's old lecture notes. They are mostly theoretical so you will have to read something else for implementation techniques. But implementation is just programming. I think it is important to understand some theory if you're going to implement anything cryptographic, since it will help you avoid a lot of dumb errors that get made all the time. https://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~rogaway/classes/227/spring05/book/main.pdf https://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~rogaway/classes/227/spring05/boo...
- mike456 4y agoTheo Tenzer: Third Epoche of Cryptography
- mike456 4y agoSUPER SECRETO - The Third Epoch of Cryptography: Multiple, exponential, quantum-secure and above all, simple and practical Encryption for Everyone https://www.amazon.com/dp/3755761173/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/3755761173/