david wong

Hey! I'm David, cofounder of zkSecurity and the author of the Real-World Cryptography book. I was previously a crypto architect at O(1) Labs (working on the Mina cryptocurrency), before that I was the security lead for Diem (formerly Libra) at Novi (Facebook), and a security consultant for the Cryptography Services of NCC Group. This is my blog about cryptography and security and other related topics that I find interesting.

My book Real World Cryptography is out in pre-access posted June 2019

Manning Publications reached out to me last year with an opportunity for a book. I had been thinking of a book for quite some time, as I felt that the landscape lacked a book targeted to developers, students and engineers who did not want to learn about the history of cryptography, or have to sort through too many technical details and mathematic formulas, and wanted an up to date survey of modern applied cryptography. In addition, I love diagrams. I don’t understand why most books underuse them. When you think of AES-CTR what do you think about? I bet the excellent diagrams from Wikipedia just flash in your mind.

The book Real World Cryptography was released today in pre-access. This means you’ll be able to read new chapters as I write them, and be able to provide feedback on topics you wished I would include and questions you wish I would answer.

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Comments

Dan

Congratulations, David. Your blog is always a pleasure to read. I'm sure your book will be excellent.

To date, my favorite crypto book is Christof Paar's book, followed by Aumasson's "Serious Cryptography". I look forward to reading your book too.

You clearly know your stuff and have a passion for explaining it, which is awesome. I have Katz & Lindell's book, clearly they're also smart guys, but their text just puts me to sleep. I build systems, I don't want a PhD in cryptography with notation and symbols.

Eric Tinsley

I just pre-ordered the book. Looking forward to seeing the finished product in its entirety but I like what I see so far!

Dilbert Smith

Will you have source code in your book ? What programming language will it be (Java, or C#) ?

David

I am planning to use a different library and language in different chapters, right now I have used OpenSSL (the CLI), Golang (standard library) and C++ (libsodium). I haven't decided what languages/libraries I will use for the rest :) I'll probably feature Tink with Java though.

Bernhard

Hello David,

what I saw yet, you combine deep understanding of cryptography with didactical editing and real-word practical applications. I just recommended your book to a project lead taking over to build a secure high availability banking application and he found it very helpful.

Maybe you could use CrypTool 2 or JCrypTool to offer your readers a free graphical elearning application to apply and experiment with some of your cryptographic samples.

Best regards, Bernhard

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