The 11th International Cryptographic Module Conference

The 11th International Cryptographic Module Conference (ICMC) started today. This year the conference is held from September 20th to 22nd 2023 at the Shaw Center in Ottawa Canada.

The conference itself kicked off with Yi Mao, CEO of atsec US, giving the opening speech. It featured our latest animation, which has become somewhat of a tradition for us:

 

Marcos Portnoi, Laboratory Director for atsec information security, wrote the welcome letter in this year's program:

Dear Participants,
 
It is my utmost honor to welcome you to the International Cryptographic Module Conference 2023 in the beautiful city of Ottawa. This edition of ICMC marks the 10th anniversary of the conference, which was launched by atsec in September 2013 with the goal of bringing the community involved in cryptographic modules together.
 
This year, we have over 90 presentations in nine tracks, including Certification Programs, Post-Quantum Cryptography, Random Bit Generators and Entropy, Crypto Technology, Payment Card Industry, Embedded/IoT, and Open-Source Cryptography. In this city founded on the power of trading and eventually becoming a technology hub, we will trade ideas and knowledge among members from industry, laboratories, government, academia: all of us who love a good talk about cryptography. And of course, since any sort of product this year needs to have a checkbox for Artificial Intelligence (AI)--and I mean any sort of product, from search engines to progressive corrective lenses to mattress softness regulators, and extra credit is granted if one can fit "generative AI" in the description--we also want to talk about it and we are bringing a panel with experts in AI to discuss the (hopefully concrete) applications of AI for our work.
 
It is always interesting to witness the evolution in the conference among the years. Last year at the ICMC for instance, the Entropy Source Validation (ESV) was newly launched and Stateful Hash-Based Signatures (HBS), even though approved, had incipient implementations, still not testable via ACVP. Today, the ESV is at full throttle and HBS has one of its algorithms, LMS, now fully testable via ACVP and recently awarded a CAVP algorithm certificate.
 
One topic that particularly excites me is Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC), and this year's ICMC has many interesting presentations in the track dedicated to PQC. The understanding and use cases of HBS have evolved substantially and the industry is better equipped to propose optimizations in the form through which those alluring yet brittle algorithms may be reviewed and evaluated for compliance with the standards. We see these initiatives in the very active Cryptographic Module User Forum (CMUF) working groups.
 
Again, my warmest welcome and may we enjoy our time!
 
Marcos Portnoi, PhD.
Laboratory  Director
atsec information security corporation

We are proud to work with the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) on shortening the FIPS queue through automation. Visit our colleagues at booth 200/202 to learn more.

This year, atsec colleagues are part of panel discussions and will be presenting on a variety of topics:

• EFP/EFT Testing at Security Level 3 and 4 and Remote Testing Advocacy
  Renaudt Nunez
• Panel: Facing the Future: The Next ISO/IEC 19790
  Yi Mao, et al.
• Panel: Testing and Assessment for Quantum Safe Cryptography
  Marcos Portnoi, et al.
• Kyber and Dilithium Real Life Lessons
  Stephan Mueller
• Equivalence Classes in AES
  David Cornwell
• Filling the Gaps in FIPS Cryptography
  Joachim Vandermissen
• Panel: Bringing Crypto Compliance and Validation Testing Objectives
  Together for FIPS 140-3
  Yi Mao, Stephan Mueller, et al.
• Attestation and FIPS: Past, Present and Future
  Alessandro Fazio
  

• Marcos Portnoi is also hosting the Post-Quantum Crypto track.

As always we are looking forward to interesting presentations, discussions and exchange between the vendors, labs, government entities and end users.