Software remains completely functional but impervious to
reverse-engineering
UCLA computer science professor Amit Sahai and a team of
researchers have designed a system to encrypt software so that it only allows
someone to use a program as intended while preventing any deciphering of the
code behind it. This is known in computer science as "software
obfuscation," and it is the first time it has been accomplished.
Sahai, who specializes in cryptography at UCLA's Henry
Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, collaborated with Sanjam
Garg, who recently earned his doctorate at UCLA and is now at IBM Research;
Craig Gentry, Shai Halevi and Mariana Raykova of IBM Research; and Brent
Waters, an assistant professor of computer science at the University of Texas
at Austin. Garg worked with Sahai as a student when the research was done.