Bailey Whitfield 'Whit' Diffie (born June 5 1944) is a
USThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
cryptographer and one of the pioneers of
public-key cryptographyPublic-key cryptography is a cryptographic approach, employed by many cryptographic algorithms and cryptosystems, whose distinguishing characteristic is the use of asymmetric key algorithms instead of or in addition to symmetric key algorithms...
.
He received a
Bachelor of ScienceA Bachelor of Science is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for completed courses that generally last three to five years ....
degree in
mathematicsMathematics is the science and study of quantity, structure, space, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns, formulate new conjectures, and establish truth by rigorous deduction from appropriately chosen axioms and definitions....
from the
Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological research...
in 1965.
Diffie and
Martin HellmanMartin Edward Hellman is a cryptologist, famous for his invention of public key cryptography in cooperation with Whitfield Diffie and Ralph Merkle....
's paper
New Directions in Cryptography was published in 1976. It introduced a radically new method of distributing
cryptographicCryptography is the practice and study of hiding information. Modern cryptography intersects the disciplines of mathematics, computer science, and engineering...
keys, that went far toward solving one of the fundamental problems of cryptography,
key distributionIn symmetric key cryptography, both parties must possess a secret key which they must exchange prior to using any encryption. Distribution of secret keys has been problematic until recently, because it involved face-to-face meeting, use of a trusted courier, or sending the key through an existing...
.
Bailey Whitfield 'Whit' Diffie (born June 5 1944) is a
USThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
cryptographer and one of the pioneers of
public-key cryptographyPublic-key cryptography is a cryptographic approach, employed by many cryptographic algorithms and cryptosystems, whose distinguishing characteristic is the use of asymmetric key algorithms instead of or in addition to symmetric key algorithms...
.
He received a
Bachelor of ScienceA Bachelor of Science is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for completed courses that generally last three to five years ....
degree in
mathematicsMathematics is the science and study of quantity, structure, space, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns, formulate new conjectures, and establish truth by rigorous deduction from appropriately chosen axioms and definitions....
from the
Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological research...
in 1965.
Diffie and
Martin HellmanMartin Edward Hellman is a cryptologist, famous for his invention of public key cryptography in cooperation with Whitfield Diffie and Ralph Merkle....
's paper
New Directions in Cryptography was published in 1976. It introduced a radically new method of distributing
cryptographicCryptography is the practice and study of hiding information. Modern cryptography intersects the disciplines of mathematics, computer science, and engineering...
keys, that went far toward solving one of the fundamental problems of cryptography,
key distributionIn symmetric key cryptography, both parties must possess a secret key which they must exchange prior to using any encryption. Distribution of secret keys has been problematic until recently, because it involved face-to-face meeting, use of a trusted courier, or sending the key through an existing...
. It has become known as
Diffie-Hellman key exchangeDiffie-Hellman key exchange is a cryptographic protocol that allows two parties that have no prior knowledge of each other to jointly establish a shared secret key over an insecure communications channel...
. The article also seems to have stimulated the almost immediate public development of a new class of encryption algorithms, the asymmetric key algorithms.
Diffie was Manager of Secure Systems Research for Northern Telecom, where he designed the key management architecture for the PDSO security system for
X.25X.25 is an ITU-T standard protocol suite for packet switched wide area network communication. An X.25 WAN consists of packet-switching exchange nodes as the networking hardware, and leased lines, Plain old telephone service connections or ISDN connections as physical links...
networks.
In 1991 he joined
Sun MicrosystemsSun Microsystems, Inc. is a multinational vendor of computers, computer components, computer software, and information technology services, founded on February 24, 1982...
Laboratories (in
Menlo Park, CaliforniaMenlo Park is an affluent city in San Mateo County, in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. It is located at latitude 37°29' North, longitude 122°9' East. Menlo Park had 29,964 inhabitants as of the 2007 U.S. Census.-History:...
) as a Distinguished
EngineerEngineers are concerned with developing economical and safe solutions to practical problems, by applying mathematics and scientific knowledge while considering technical constraints. The term is derived from the Latin root "ingenium," meaning "cleverness"...
, working primarily on public policy aspects of cryptography. As of May 2007 Diffie remains with Sun, serving as its Chief Security Officer and as a Vice President. He is also a Sun Fellow.
In 1992 he was awarded a
DoctorateA doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries represents the highest level of formal study or research in a given field. In some countries it also refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder to practice in a specific profession . The best-known example...
in Technical Sciences (Honoris Causa) by the
ETH ZurichETH Zurich or Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich is a science and technology university in the City of Zurich, Switzerland...
. He is also a fellow of the
Marconi FoundationThe Guglielmo Marconi International Fellowship Foundation, briefly called Marconi Foundation and currently known as the Marconi Society, was established by Gioia Marconi Braga in 1974 to commemorate the centennial of the birth of his father Guglielmo Marconi).In describing the mission and...
and visiting fellow of the
Isaac Newton InstituteOpened in 1992, the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences is a national and international visitor research institute for mathematics and theoretical physics. It is part of Cambridge University in Cambridge, England, and is named after the famous English mathematician Isaac Newton, who...
. He has received various awards from other organisations. In July 2008, he was also awarded a Degree of Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) by
Royal Holloway, University of LondonRoyal Holloway, University of London is a constituent college of the University of London. The college has around 7,345 undergraduate and postgraduate students from over 120 different countries...
.
Diffie and
Susan LandauSusan Landau is an American mathematician and engineer. She currently specializes in internet security at Sun Microsystems. In 1989 she introduced the first algorithm for deciding which nested radicals can be denested....
's book
Privacy on the Line was published in 1998 on the politics of wiretapping and encryption. An updated and expanded edition appeared in 2007.
Diffie is a visiting professor at the
Information Security GroupThe Information Security Group or ISG is one of the largest academic security groups in the world. It is located at Royal Holloway, University of London....
based at
Royal Holloway, University of LondonRoyal Holloway, University of London is a constituent college of the University of London. The college has around 7,345 undergraduate and postgraduate students from over 120 different countries...
.
External links
- Oral history interview with Martin Hellman, Charles Babbage Institute
The Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking.-Activities:...
, University of Minnesota. Leading cryptography scholar Martin HellmanMartin Edward Hellman is a cryptologist, famous for his invention of public key cryptography in cooperation with Whitfield Diffie and Ralph Merkle....
discusses the circumstances and fundamental insights of his invention of public key cryptography with collaborators Whitfield Diffie and Ralph MerkleRalph C. Merkle is a researcher in public key cryptography, and more recently a researcher and speaker on molecular nanotechnology and cryonics...
at Stanford University in the mid-1970s.
- Cranky Geeks Episode 133
- Wired Magazine biography of Whitfield Diffie
- Interview with Whitfield Diffie on Chaosradio Express International
- Cranky Geeks Episode 71
- Risking Communications Security: Potential Hazards of the Protect America Act
- Diffie at the 2009 RSA conference, video with Diffie participating on the Cryptographer's Panel, April 21, 2009, Moscone Center, San Francisco