Fernando Virdia

Fernando Virdia is a post-doctoral researcher in NOVA LINCS, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa. Previously, he was a Research Scientist at Intel Labs and a post-doctoral researcher at the Applied Cryptography Group at ETH Zürich and fellow of the Zurich Information Security and Privacy Center. In 2021, he graduated with a PhD from the Information Security Group at Royal Holloway, University of London, under the supervision of Martin R. Albrecht. Previously, he graduated with a MSc in Applied Mathematics (2016) and a BSc in Mathematics (2014) from Imperial College London. Fernando’s main expertise is analysing the concrete security of cryptographic primitives and protocols. This includes estimating and experimentally verifying the cost of classical and quantum cryptanalytic attacks and constructing security proofs. Most of his work has been published at IACR cryptography venues, including EUROCRYPT, ASIACRYPT, TCHES, PKC. He has also published at security venues, including ACM CCS. His publications on the hardness of attacks on lattice hardness assumptions and on quantum attacks on block ciphers have had a meaningful impact on the NIST Post-Quantum Standardization Process, and have been cited hundreds of times. Fernando’s current research focuses on developing new practical functionality for secure messaging. He also keeps actively working on cryptanalysis, with a special focus towards post-quantum cryptographic hardness assumptions. More details on his background and work can be found on his personal website, https://fundamental.domains. During his time at ETH Zurich, he supervised one master and one bachelor students.