This book is intended as a reference for professional cryptographers, presenting the
techniques and algorithms of greatest interest to the current practitioner, along with the supporting motivation and background material. It also provides a comprehensive source from which to learn cryptography, serving both students and instructors. In addition, the rigorous treatment, breadth, and extensive bibliographic material should make it an important reference for research professionals.
The goal was to assimilate the existing cryptographic knowledge of industrial interest into one consistent, self-contained volume accessible to engineers in practice, to computer scientists and mathematicians in academia, and to motivated non-specialists with a strong desire to learn cryptography. Such a task is beyond the scope of each of the following: research papers, which by nature focus on narrow topics using very specialized (and often non-standard) terminology; survey papers, which typically address, at most, a small number of major topics at a high level; and (regretably also) most books, due to the fact that many book authors lack either practical experience or familiarity with the research literature or both. Our intent was to provide a detailed presentation of those areas of cryptography which we have found to be of greatest practical utility in our own industrial experience, while maintaining a sufficiently formal approach to be suitable both as a trustworthy reference for those whose primary interest is further research, and to provide a solid foundation for students and others first learning the subject.