Student Interviews

Naoto Ohkawa

Researching into the extension of digital signatures, to help prevent secondary leaks of content for the future establishment of e-government.

Cryptography as the basis for digital signatures which I first learned at IISEC

At first, I was thinking about network security as my research topic, but I was attracted by Prof. Doi's talk about "how digital signatures will be a power to support e-government," and I decided to research on this topic. I received the idea for my research theme from an international conference that I had attended in June of my first year. I am working on extensions to digital signatures, including restrictions on verifiers. This can also be applied, for example, to prevent a secondary leak of content. I first learned cryptography, the basis of digital signatures, at IISEC. At first it was hard for me to understand, but at the same time I was fascinated by the mathematics.

Combining cryptography for provable security and information security

What I found interesting was the contrast between cryptography, which aims at provable security, and information security measures, which are difficult to secure due to the complexity of elements from technology to operation. However, I feel that if we break down the very high level of security awareness into something that is realistic, it can be used in the real world.

Speak up at least once in each seminar,
It's important to know what others don't know

In a regular seminar, there is a laboratory rule that even students who are not presenters must speak at least once. In some cases, knowing what others don't know can lead to new insights and a deeper understanding for the presenter. Also, the teacher does not teach us the answer, but shows us the way to get to the answer. It has helped me to develop my problem-solving skills very well (laughs).

Naoto Ohkawa
Naoto Ohkawa
Graduated from the University of Electro-Communications
Enrolled in April 2005
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