Prof. LUO Xiapu and Prof.AU Man Ho Allen have developed new algorithms to protect the assets, system, and network security of the blockchain ecosystem, providing cryptographic foundations for blockchain technology. His work has had a significant impact on the development of financial technology applications built on blockchain platforms.
LUO Xiapu Daniel is a Professor at the Department of Computing of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His research focuses on Blockchain and Smart Contracts Security, Software and System Security, IoT and Network Security. He has published over 300 papers in those areas, most of which appear in top-tier security, software engineering, and networking conferences and journals. His research led to ten best/distinguished paper awards and several awards from the industry. He regularly serves in the program committees of top-tier security and software engineering conferences. He currently also serves as an associate editor for IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (ToN) and IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (TDSC).
Existing blockchain ecosystems are vulnerable to quantum computers, since the underlying cryptographic foundations are not quantum safe, and prone to various attacks due to the vulnerabilities in their software and systems. Professor AU and Professor LUO have been working on addressing these important security issues in the blockchain ecosystem and providing the cryptographic foundations to blockchain technologies. Professor AU’s work on post-quantum cryptography has contributed to the transition to the post-quantum era by proposing quantum-safe algorithms such as anonymous cryptocash. Besides, he gave a protocol to store and use signing keys in a distributed way to prevent the single point of failure and key theft effectively. In addition, he constructed the first collusion resistant watermarking scheme for various kinds of programs. Recently, he improved efficiency of zero-knowledge proof technology, an important tool for blockchain privacy protection, via novel use of distributing computing and GPU acceleration. Professor LUO conducts holistic research on the security of blockchain ecosystems from user frontend to blockchain platforms and Layer 2 systems to smart contracts and DeFi applications. Professor LUO’s work pioneered the security assessment of smart contracts and blockchain systems by revealing critical vulnerabilities and developing innovative solutions to defend against sophisticated attacks targeting on blockchain ecosystems. Professor AU’s and Professor Luo’s contributions underscore the duo's prowess in blockchain and cybersecurity.