************************ EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ************************ The IACR Board of Directors met on August 15, 2004 during Crypto 2004 in Santa Barbara. Reports were received on the status of Eurocrypt 2004, Crypto 2004, Asiacrypt 2004, CHES 2004, Eurocrypt 2005, Crypto 2005, Asiacrypt 2005, and FSE 2005. Additional reports were received on IACR finances, IT issues, IACR elections, the IACR Fellows Committee, the Journal of Cryptology, and the IACR Newsletter, web site, and ePrint Archive. Reports were also received from the PKC, FSE, and CHES Steering Committees. The Board voted to appoint Kevin McCurley as IACR Membership Secretary through December 31, 2005. The Board voted to appoint James Hughes as IACR Newsletter Editor for a three-year term commencing January 1, 2005. The Board voted (by email) to re-appoint Ueli Maurer to a second three-year term as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Cryptology commencing January 1, 2005. The Board voted to appoint Josh Benaloh as General Chair of Crypto 2006. The Board voted to appoint Cynthia Dwork as Program Chair of Crypto 2006. The Board voted to invite Ralph Merkle to deliver the 2005 IACR Distinguished Lecture. The Board voted to hold Asiacrypt 2006 in Shanghai, China with Dingyi Pei as General Chair. The Board voted to appoint Xuejia Lai as Program Chair for Asiacrypt 2006. The Board voted to accept a proposal to hold CHES 2005 in Edinburgh, Scotland. The Board voted to accept a proposal to hold PKC 2006 in New York City. ************************ DETAILED MINUTES ************************ Board of Directors Meeting Crypto 2004 Santa Barbara 15 August 2004 Board President Clark called the meeting to order at 11:00. Present were Benaloh, Berson, Biham, Cachin, Clark, Dawson, Damgård, Haber, Hughes, Kim, Langford, Lenstra, Matsumoto, McCurley, Rangan, Quisquater, and Wright as well as Hideki Imai representing the IEEE Information and Theory Society and Xuejia Lai representing Asiacrypt 2006. Proxies were held for Camenisch by Cachin and for Knudsen by Preneel. ________________________________________________________________________ The agenda for the meeting was reviewed. It consisted of the following. Opening Matters =============== Welcome participants - identification of proxies (Clark) (5) Review and approve agenda (All) (5) Approve Minutes from last meeting * (Benaloh/Clark) (5) Review of Actions from last meeting * (Benaloh/Clark) (10) Matters arising from last meeting (Benaloh/Clark) (10) Crypto 2004 status (Hughes) (5) Officer's Reports ================= Newsletter/eprint archive (Cachin) (5) Treasurer (Langford) (5) Membership Secretary (IT Strategy/Online registration) (McCurley) (20) Appointees ========== Membership Secretary (Clark) (10) Newsletter Editor (Clark) (10) Internal Committee Reports ========================== Review of Committee structure (Clark) (5) IT Strategy Committee (McCurley) (2) Election Committee (Dawson/Hughes/Quisquater) (2) Fellows Committee (Damgård) (2) External Committee Reports ========================== Asiacrypt steering committee (Dawson) (10) PKC Steering Committee (Desmedt) (5) FSE Steering Committee (Preneel) (5) CHES Steering Committee (Quisquater) (5) Conferences/Workshops (since last BoD Meeting) ============================================== Eurocrypt 2004 (Cachin) (5) CHES 2004 (Quisquater) (5) Forthcoming Conferences ======================= Eurocrypt 2005 (Damgård) (5) Asiacrypt 2004 (Kim) (10) Asiacrypt 2005 (Pandu Rangan) (10) Asiacrypt 2006 Proposal (Lai) (15) Crypto 2005 (Haber) (5) Forthcoming Workshops ===================== FSE 2005 (Preneel) (2) CHES 2005 Proposal (Quisquater) (10) PKC 2006 Proposal (Yung) (10) Conference Chairs ================= Program and General Chair List Maintenance (Benaloh) (5) Crypto 2006 General Chair (Benaloh/Clark) (10) Crypto 2006 Program Chair (Benaloh/Clark) (10) Asiacrypt 2006 Program Chair (Benaloh/Clark) (10) Other Business ============== Distinguished Lecturer Crypto 2005 (Clark) (10) "In Co-Operation With" Updates (Preneel) (5) Cooperation between IACR and ITS (IEEE Information Theory Society) (Imai) (10) Report on Approach by RSA Conference Organiser (Berson) (3) S-V Relationship (including LNCS & ISI) (Clark) (10) Closing Matters =============== Lenstra asked that a clarification of the By-Laws and the openness of the Chair selection and review process be added to other business. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark asked that cell phones be turned off for the remainder of the meeting and that laptops be used for IACR business only. ________________________________________________________________________ Corrections to past minutes were then received. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark then began a discussion of past action items. Feedback on General Chair Guidelines had been completed. Clark would be meeting with Alfred Hoffman of Springer-Verlag the following evening to discuss a possible increase to the Journal of Cryptology page count. McCurley would report on the migration to a new IACR server. Preneel arrived at 11:06. Clark and Langford would meet with Micky Swick regarding IACR Secretariat issues. A plan to establish an international banking account with HSBC would be deferred for the next IACR Treasurer. Terms of reference for a new Membership Secretary were to be written. Clark noted that Prof. Pei was unable to attend the conference due to inability to obtain a visa, and Hughes added that visas were denied to four potential delegates. Haber noted that Bruce Schneier is collecting data on such cases. Clark, Preneel, and Dawson would review the General Chair Guidelines with regard to possible discounts for local members. Kim would present a proposal for Asiacrypt 2006. Clark would contact Hideki Imai regarding "in Co-operation with the IACR" status for IEEE Computing Society events. Knudsen would update the Program Chair Guidelines regarding parallel submissions. Cachin noted that there was much to update in the Guidelines, and Clark asserted that this must be better maintained. McCurley and Hughes volunteered to edit the Guidelines. ________________________________________________________________________ Crypto 2004 General Chair Hughes then reported on the status of the conference. He said that there were 410 registrants as of that time, that the conference would have a surplus if those who had committed to paying on site did so, and that twelve letters of invitation had been issued (with one attempted fraud). Hughes suggested that a public key with which the General Chair could sign documents would be helpful. McCurley suggested that invitation requests needed to be filtered to catch scams and disreputable requests. Haber said that he would discuss this point with Hughes and asked that a few sentences on this topic be added to the General Chair Guidelines. Hughes noted that bank information is routinely exchanged with people attempting to register. Hughes said that stipends were given to several students but that one request from a professor had been denied. Hughes also said that the Kluwer merger with Springer-Verlag had created some confusion and that a formal process with fees for book exhibiters should be established. Clark noted that there has always been an informal special arrangement with Springer-Verlag, and Cachin noted that at Eurocrypt 2004 they had "paid" with books. Clark said that he'd be happy to formalize this. Berson noted that the IACR contract with Springer-Verlag for the Journal of Cryptology obliges the IACR to promote Springer-Verlag at meetings. Hughes asked how charges for publishers should be structured, and Benaloh suggested a charge per table per day. Clark asked if Springer-Verlag should get special treatment, and the consensus was that they should. Preneel expressed the view that the display of books is important and should be encouraged. Wright asked about stipends, and Hughes responded that about 15 student stipends had been granted out of approximately 100 students. He added that the remaining delegates included approximately 100 from each of academia, industry, and government. McCurley noted that the proceedings contract with Springer-Verlag included the same clause as the contract for the Journal of Cryptology. ________________________________________________________________________ Newsletter Editor Cachin then reported on the status of the Newsletter. He said that there had been delays due his involvement with Eurocrypt 2004. Cachin noted that he still produced both email and web editions of the Newsletter. He also noted that minutes had not appeared recently but would shortly. Cachin also said that the ePrint server was proceeding as usual but that it would be necessary to set up our own ePrint server since the UCSD would no longer be a host. Thanks were given by all for Cachin's work as Newsletter Editor. Berson added that the Newsletter is important and added his personal thanks. ________________________________________________________________________ Treasurer Langford then reported on IACR finances. She said that there had been no substantial changes since Eurocrypt 2004. As of January 1, the IACR surplus was roughly US$367,000. Eurocrypt 2003 suffered a loss of roughly $40,000 Crypto 2003 returned a surplus of roughly $40,000. Asiacrypt 2003 suffered a loss of roughly $500. PKC 2003 broke even. FSE 2003 returned a surplus of roughly $10,000. Eurocrypt 2004 returned a surplus of roughly $14,000. FSE 2004 and PKC 2004 broke even. Berson asked if bank accounts for credit card receipts were kept separate from other accounts, and Langford replied that they were. McCurley suggested that a better structure of IACR accounts was necessary. Hughes noted that the Crypto 2004 Program Committee had exceeded its budget by $3,000. Clark thanked Langford for her roughly five years as Treasurer, and a unanimous vote of thanks was given. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark then raised the issue of the vacant Membership Secretary position. McCurley gave a brief update of the IACR information technology strategy that he reported on during the Eurocrypt 2004 Board Meeting. He noted that Crypto 2004 served as the first large-scale test of on-line registration and that despite numerous challenges, the system was successful. McCurley announced that he intended to remain involved with the IACR but to not continue as a member of the Board. ________________________________________________________________________ The Board recessed for a short break at 11:43. The Board reconvened at 11:47. ________________________________________________________________________ McCurley then updated the Board on the status of the information technology strategy. He said that the old membership database was still in use but that migration to a new database was in progress. McCurley reported that 161 delegates to Crypto 2004 had registered on line and that 100 had paid on line. He said that credit card payments worked with funds going directly to the Crypto conference account -- although a few flaws were reported by Joe Allegretti of UCSB. He also noted that housing was managed separately by UCSB. Hughes reported that some fax registrants complained of slow feedback. Cachin suggested that the Crypto conference web page be edited to reflect the changes in procedures, and Haber took responsibility for doing so. McCurley then reported that there were still some minor issues to be resolved including account access and the different views seen by different people. He said that documentation of the system was 80% complete, and that the administrative interface had many features. Hughes suggested that the late fee date be clarified. McCurley then offered his view of the various IACR roles that should be involved with the system. He saw the Membership Secretary role as that of database administrator, web developer, and management contact for General Chairs; the Treasurer role as funds management; and the General Chairs as the primary problem solvers. McCurley then discussed the handoff strategy for the system. He said that the web site for Asiacrypt was already done, that the next Membership Secretary should manage the database, and that McCurley would make himself available as a resource. Unanimous thanks were then given to McCurley for his efforts. Clark then observed that this work had brought the IACR a long way but that more needed to be done. He suggested that the IACR Treasurer should be involved with and manage refunds and that the terms of reference for this office should be clarified. Clark then turned to the role of the Membership Secretary which he described as maintenance of the database, support of all IACR conferences and workshops, and maintenance of the integrity of the data. Cachin suggested that more than one person should manage this, and McCurley agreed that it is a big job. Clark noted that this role overlapped with that of the Newsletter Editor, and Cachin suggested renaming the Newsletter Editor to Publications (or Communications) Chair. Clark noted that a change in Newsletter Editor title and/or responsibilities may require a change in the By-Laws, and McCurley suggested that many By-Laws changes should be combined into a single effort. Berson noted that the first revision of the IACR By-Laws took five years and the second took two years. He added that it was too late to do it that year. McCurley suggested that the need was not urgent but should proceed, and Clark expressed his wish for a clarification of terms of reference. ________________________________________________________________________ The Board then recessed for lunch at 12:32 The Board reconvened at 13:07. ________________________________________________________________________ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to appoint Kevin McCurley as IACR Membership Secretary though 12/31/2005. ************************************************************************ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to appoint James Hughes as IACR Newsletter Editor for a 3-year term commencing 1/1/2005. ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ Clark then introduced reports from the Election and Fellows Committees (noting that the Information Technology Committee had been dissolved). ________________________________________________________________________ Hughes reported on the Election Committee and urged Board members to solicit candidates. Wright asked for clarification on who could nominate who and whether students could make nominations. The By-Laws read "Any IACR member can nominate another regular member..." Matsumoto announced that he would stand for re-election. ________________________________________________________________________ Damgård then reported on the Fellows Committee. He said that the committee membership remained unchanged although he had replaced Feigenbaum in the role of chair and solicited nominations for IACR Fellows. ________________________________________________________________________ Dawson then said that he had nothing to report for the Asiacrypt Steering Committee. ________________________________________________________________________ Kim then reported that the PKC Steering Committee had met on March 2, 2004 in Singapore and that it made a recommendation for PKC 2006 that would be presented subsequently. ________________________________________________________________________ Preneel then reported for the FSE Steering Committee that there were no updates since the Eurocrypt 2004 Board Meeting but that they were currently soliciting proposals. ________________________________________________________________________ Quisquater then reported for the CHES Steering Committee consisting of himself, Burt Kaliski, Cetin Koc, Christof Paar, and Colin Walter that had met the previous week and approved a proposal for CHES 2005. ________________________________________________________________________ Eurocrypt 2004 Program Chair Cachin then reported on the conference. He reported a surplus of about $14,000 -- about half of which resulted from currency fluctuation. He said that about an additional $1,000 had been earned from sales of extra copies of the proceedings. Cachin reported 427 total registrants (including organizers and stipend recipients) of which 413 were paid (also including stipend recipients) and 10 who did not show. He said that the total income was $311,000 (including $32,000 from sponsors) and that total expenses were $296,800 leaving a total surplus of $14,200. McCurley suggested that an additional fee be charged for on-site registration, and Preneel supported this idea. Rangan said that this would be difficult in India since the currency is not freely convertible and it is typical for commitments to be made to pay on-site (without late fees). Rangan asked what the major expense had been, and Cachin responded that 75% of the costs were food and that there were 50-60 leftover proceedings. ________________________________________________________________________ Quisquater then reported on CHES 2004. He said that Berk Sunar and Christoff Paar were General Chairs and than Marc Joye and Jean-Jacques Quisquater were Program Chairs. He reported that it was held in Cambridge, Massachusetts with 32 out of 125 submitted papers accepted, 3 invited talks, and 190 attendees. He added that Cryptography Research, RSA, and Intel were sponsors, there was a rump session and 2 paper awards, and that the surplus would be used for the following year's student grants. ________________________________________________________________________ The Board then recessed for a break at 14:26. The Board reconvened at 14:38. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark began by thanking all for proceeding apace. ________________________________________________________________________ Eurocrypt 2005 General Chair Damgård then reported on the status of the conference. He said that there were no major changes since his last report and that sponsorship had been obtained. He said that registration had been set at $530 with a break-even point of 315 attendees. Damgård reported a November 15 paper submission deadline and a conference date collision with the Symposium on Theory of Computation (STOC) and asked when conference registration should open to which Cachin responded January or February. McCurley said that he intended to eliminate fax registration. Damgård asked if the late fee was up to the General Chair, and Wright responded that it was at the discretion of the General Chair. ________________________________________________________________________ Asiacrypt 2004 General Chair Kim then reported on the status of the conference. He said that the Korean government would be providing support of US$10,000, that 208 papers had been submitted from 31 countries of which 35 had been accepted (a rate of 16.8%), that registration was set at US$568, and that hotel rooms were available at US$150 per night (a 50% discount). Clark asked if sponsorship would be used to reduce registration costs, and Kim replied that it would be targeted to invited speakers and proceedings. Lenstra asked what the break-even point was, and Kim responded that it was set at 189 attendees (and that 210 were expected). Dawson asked about hotel alternatives, and Kim replied that other options were provided. ________________________________________________________________________ Asiacrypt 2005 General Chair Rangan then reported on the status of the conference. He said that he had sought support from local branches of many international companies and that hotel booking should be easy. He noted that Indocrypt would be held in Bangalore December 1-4 (immediately before Asiacrypt) and that details would be provided at Asiacrypt 2004. Rangan added that hotels were offering 50-60% discounts and would be US$80-120 per night with cheaper alternatives available. He also said that the Indian Institute of Technology would make student rooms available at $5 per night. Rangan said that registration would be US$350-400 including the $88 IACR membership. Preneel noted that FSE 2004 had gone well except for hotel registration, and Rangan replied that these hotels should be fine. ________________________________________________________________________ Xuejia Lai then presented a proposal to hold Asiacrypt 2006 in Shanghai, China in December of 2006 with Dengyi Pei as General Chair. Lai observed that Shanghai is China's largest city with 2 international airports (served by more than 40 airlines) at 13.5km and 30km from the city and has a subtropical climate. He said that the technical venue would be the Shanghai Science Hall and listed two hotels: a 3 star hotel within the science hall and a 5 star hotel nearby (at approximately US$100 per night). Lai estimated 150 attendees including 20-30 from China. Dawson then said that this proposal had been endorsed by the Asiacrypt Steering Committee. Berson asked why Lai didn't expect more than 20-30 attendees from China, and Lai replied that registration fees were prohibitive. McCurley expressed the view that it is a problem if conferences are too expensive for local attendees and suggested that the IACR consider scaling back. Rangan suggested a new class of registration for local attendees. ************************************************************************ The Board then voted 17-0 with 1 abstention to accept the proposal to hold Asiacrypt 2006 in Shanghai with Dengyi Pei as General Chair subject to approval of the budget. ************************************************************************ Lenstra then asked if Asiacrypt Steering Committee meetings were open, and Dawson replied that they were open to members of the Board. ________________________________________________________________________ Crypto 2005 General Chair Haber then reported on the status of the conference. He said that plans were well underway and would be following in due course and gave the dates as August 14-18. Lenstra asked if the food plans would be the same, and Haber said that he would hear recommendations. ________________________________________________________________________ Preneel then reported on the status of FSE 2005. He said that the workshop would be held February 21-23 and that the Call for Papers was already out. He added that registration would be 360 euro including the IACR membership fee. ________________________________________________________________________ Quisquater then reported on the status of CHES 2005. He said that the proposal accepted by the CHES Steering Committee was to hold the workshop August 29 to September 1 the Roxburghe Hotel in Edinburgh, Scotland (noting that CHES had been alternating between U.S. and European venues). Quisquater said that Colin Walter and Christof Paar would handle local arrangements and that Berk Sumar and Josyula Rao would be Program Chairs. He added that the Roxburghe was a 4 star hotel. Quisquater said that registration would be US$883 but that attempts would be made to reduce the cost further (perhaps to US$725). ************************************************************************ The Board then voted 12-1 with 6 abstentions to accept the proposal to hold CHES 2005 in Edinburgh, Scotland. ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ Kim then reported on a proposal approved by the PKC Steering Committee to hold PKC 2006 at Columbia University in New York City April 24-26 with Moti Yung as Program Chair and Tal Malkin and Yevgeniy Dodis as General Chairs. Kim said that the estimated registration fee would be $520 ($265 for students). Lenstra asked why the late date was chosen, and Kim responded that it was due to weather. Preneel noted that the break even point had been set somewhat higher than usual. ************************************************************************ The Board then voted 18-0 with 1 abstention to accept the proposal to hold PKC 2006 in New York City. ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ The Board then spent a few minutes maintaining the IACR service lists. ________________________________________________________________________ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to ask Josh Benaloh to serve as Crypto 2006 General Chair. [Benaloh subsequently accepted.] ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to ask Cynthia Dwork to serve as Crypto 2006 Program Chair. [Dwork subsequently accepted.] ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to ask Xuejia Lai to serve as Asiacrypt 2006 Program Chair. [Lai subsequently accepted.] ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ The Board then recessed for a break at 16:39. The Board reconvened at 16:44. ________________________________________________________________________ ************************************************************************ The Board then voted to ask Ralph Merkle to deliver the 2005 IACR Distinguished Lecture at the Crypto 2005 conference. [Merkle subsequently accepted.] ************************************************************************ ________________________________________________________________________ Preneel then raised the issue of "in Co-operation with the IACR" status. He said that SAC was interested in obtaining this status but noted that the efforts and commitments on their part were substantial for which they would get very little in return. Clark acknowledged that there was a problem here and committed to working with Berson to make the status more attractive for all concerned. ________________________________________________________________________ Hideki Imai then offered a proposal for the IACR to co-sponsor the Information Theory Workshop with the IEEE Information Theory Society. Berson described the IACR position on sponsorships and "in Co-operation with the IACR" status, and Imai replied that "in Co-operation with the IACR" status would suffice. Dawson volunteered to serve as a liaison between the two organizations, and Cachin offered to assist. Clark said that we have provided "in Co-operation with the IACR" status and committed to approaching Maurer to serve as a link between the two organizations. ________________________________________________________________________ Berson then reported receiving a request from Ann Markus of "nth Degree" regarding exploring the possibility of affiliating the IACR with RSA conferences. Wright suggested that they could provide sponsorship for IACR conferences, and Haber encouraged our suggesting this to them. Preneel suggested talking with Burt Kaliski and/or Ari Juels. Berson asked how we should respond. Benaloh said that we should suggest sponsorship. Clark said that we should both suggest sponsorship and talk with Kaliski and Juels. ________________________________________________________________________ Preneel then raised an issue brought to him by Jose Domingo-Ferrer regarding the recent exclusion by the International Science Index (ISI) of Springer-Verlag publications (and hence the Journal of Cryptology). Clark expressed the view of the Board that the Springer-Verlag Lecture Notes in Computer Science series should be included within the ISI. Haber suggested that information should be obtained from Springer-Verlag as to how best to pressure ISI. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark then turned to other business -- beginning with possible revisions in the IACR By-Laws. Benaloh asked that any suggested revisions be submitted by May. Clark asked that suggested revisions be submitted to him. ________________________________________________________________________ Lenstra then expressed frustration at the web discussions among the Asiacrypt 2004 program committee being anonymous and said that this caused problems. Preneel noted that the Program Committee had voted to do it this way. ________________________________________________________________________ Clark observed that the Program Chair Guidelines were not being read diligently and said that he would follow this up further. ________________________________________________________________________ Preneel then noted that the problem of duplicate concurrent conference submissions was growing, and McCurley suggested that an IACR server could perform automated comparisons. ________________________________________________________________________ The agenda for the Membership Meeting was then compiled. Warnings about duplicate submissions headed the list. The second item was an alert about visa problems. Hughes suggested that a six-month lead time for visa applications be encouraged. McCurley suggested that more data needed to be collected. Berson expressed the view that U.S. visa policy was not offensive. McCurley expressed the concern that the policy is often unofficial. Wright suggested that members should be alerted of the issue. The final item added to the Membership Meeting agenda was comments on electronic registration. ________________________________________________________________________ The meeting adjourned at 17:52. ________________________________________________________________________ Respectfully submitted Josh Benaloh IACR Secretary