Fermi Ma

I am a joint Simons-Berkeley Postdoctoral Fellow and Simons Quantum Postdoctoral Fellow, working with Prof. Umesh Vazirani and Prof. Alessandro Chiesa. I earned my Ph.D. at Princeton in 2021 under the fantastic supervision of Prof. Mark Zhandry. Before that, I received my B.S. in mathematics from MIT.

My primary research area is cryptography. I am particularly interested in the interplay between quantum information, interactive protocols, and computational hardness.

CV (as of September 2021)
[email protected]

Papers

Authors on all papers are in alphabetical order.

• Post-Quantum Zero Knowledge, Revisited (or: How to Do Quantum Rewinding Undetectably) [pdf]
  Alex Lombardi, Fermi Ma, and Nicholas Spooner

• Post-Quantum Succinct Arguments: Breaking the Quantum Rewinding Barrier [pdf]
  Alessandro Chiesa, Fermi Ma, Nicholas Spooner, and Mark Zhandry
  FOCS 2021 (invited to FOCS 2021 Special Issue)
  QCRYPT 2021

• One-Way Functions Imply Secure Computation in a Quantum World [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Andrea Coladangelo, Dakshita Khurana, and Fermi Ma
  CRYPTO 2021
  QIP 2021 (joint plenary talk with [GLSV])
  QCRYPT 2021 (invited talk)

• On the Round Complexity of Secure Quantum Computation [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Andrea Coladangelo, Dakshita Khurana, and Fermi Ma
  CRYPTO 2021
  QIP 2021
  QCRYPT 2021

• Does Fiat-Shamir Require a Cryptographic Hash Function? [pdf]
  Yilei Chen, Alex Lombardi, Fermi Ma, and Willy Quach
  CRYPTO 2021

• Leakage-Resilient Key Exchange and Two-Seed Extractors [pdf]
  Xin Li, Fermi Ma, Willy Quach, and Daniel Wichs
  CRYPTO 2020

• Affine Determinant Programs: A Framework for Obfuscation and Witness Encryption [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Yuval Ishai, Aayush Jain, Fermi Ma, Amit Sahai, and Mark Zhandry
  ITCS 2020

• On the (In)security of Kilian-Based SNARGs [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Liron Bronfman, Justin Holmgren, Fermi Ma, and Ron D. Rothblum
  TCC 2019

• Public-Key Function Private Hidden Vector Encryption and More [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Brent Carmer, Abhishek Jain, Zhengzhong Jin, Tancrède Lepoint, Fermi Ma, Tal Malkin, Alex J. Malozemoff, and Mariana Raykova
  ASIACRYPT 2019

• The Distinction Between Fixed and Random Generators in Group-Based Assumptions [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Fermi Ma, and Mark Zhandry
  CRYPTO 2019

• New Techniques for Obfuscating Conjunctions [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Tancrède Lepoint, Fermi Ma, and Mark Zhandry
  EUROCRYPT 2019

• Return of GGH15: Provable Security Against Zeroizing Attacks [pdf]
  James Bartusek, Jiaxin Guan, Fermi Ma, and Mark Zhandry
  TCC 2018

• The MMAP Strikes Back: Obfuscation and New Multilinear Maps Immune to CLT13 Zeroizing Attacks [pdf]
  Fermi Ma and Mark Zhandry
  TCC 2018

• Encryptor Combiners: A Unified Approach to Multiparty NIKE, (H)IBE, and Broadcast Encryption [pdf]
  Fermi Ma and Mark Zhandry

Talks

• Post-Quantum Succinct Arguments: Breaking the Quantum-Rewinding Barrier [Slides]
  Simons Quantum Colloquium (Oct 2021)
  QCRYPT 2021 (August 2021)
  MIT Cryptography and Information Security Seminar (May 2021)
  Weizmann + Tel Aviv University Seminar (April 2021)
  Cornell Crypto Seminar (April 2021)
  NTT Research (April 2021)

• Quantum Security and Fiat-Shamir for Cryptographic Protocols [Slides]
  PhD Defense Talk (August 2021)

• Does Fiat-Shamir Require a Cryptographic Hash Function? [Slides]
  CRYPTO 2021 (August 2021)
  UIUC (November 2020)
  NTT Research (August 2020)

• On the (In)security of Kilian-Based SNARGs [Slides]
  Tokyo Crypto Day (December 2019)
  Charles River Crypto Day (November 2019)

• Public-Key Function-Private Hidden Vector Encryption (and More) [Slides]
  ASIACRYPT 2019 (December 2019)

• The Distinction Between Fixed and Random Generators in Group-Based Assumptions [Slides]
  CRYPTO 2019 (August 2019)

• Affine Determinant Programs: A New Approach to Obfuscation [Slides]
  New Roads to Cryptopia, a CRYPTO 2019 affiliated event (August 2019)

• New Techniques for Obfuscating Conjunctions [Slides]
  EUROCRYPT 2019 (May 2019)
  New York Crypto Day (May 2019)
  UC Berkeley Cryptography Seminar (February 2019)
  Weizmann Cryptography Seminar (February 2019)
  Technion Theory Lunch (January 2019)
  IDC Herzliya (January 2019)
  SRI International (August 2018)

• A Weak Model for the CLT13 Multilinear Maps [Slides]
  TCC 2018 (November 2018)
  UCLA Cryptography Seminar (April 2018)

• Encryptor Combiners [Slides]
  Princeton General Exam Talk (May 2017)