Varun Maram

Point Reyes, California — summer of '22 (ft. Applied Crypto. Group's logo).

I am a postdoctoral fellow in the Cybersecurity Group at SandboxAQ. My current research interests lie in quantum-resistant cryptography, with an emphasis on provable post-quantum security of real-world cryptographic systems. I also have a broader interest in multi-party computation and distributed systems.

Before joining SandboxAQ, I obtained my doctoral degree at ETH Zürich in 2023 where I was part of the Applied Cryptography Group and supervised by Prof. Kenny Paterson. I also obtained a Master’s degree in computer science (with distinction) at ETH Zürich in 2019, and a Bachelor’s degree in computer science and engineering (with a minor in mathematics) at IIT Roorkee in 2017.

I’m a member of the team behind Classic McEliece, a key-encapsulation mechanism which is currently being considered for ISO standardization, and was in the fourth round of NIST’s post-quantum cryptography standardization project.

I also interned in the Advanced Cryptography team at Visa Research during the summers of 2021 (remotely from Zürich) and 2022 (in Palo Alto) where I worked on quantum cryptanalysis of symmetric-key primitives and quantum security of standard model public-key encryption schemes respectively.

Outside work, I love (pub) quizzing.

news

Mar 27, 2025	Presented our work on a “Post-quantum Cryptographic Analysis of SSH” at the Real World Crypto 2025 symposium in Sofia, Bulgaria–do check out my talk here! The corresponding paper will also appear in the proceedings of IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy later this year.
Sep 06, 2024	I’m serving on the program committee of next year’s PKC conference in Røros, Norway! Do submit your best works on public-key cryptography and related topics. Not convinced by my pitch? Well here’s a picture of a fjord in Norway to change your mind :)
Apr 16, 2024	Happy to share that our paper “Quantum CCA-Secure PKE, Revisited” received a best paper award at PKC 2024 (also my second PKC best paper award in a row!), and is invited to the Journal of Cryptology!! Many thanks to my co-author Navid Alamati for his excellent mentorship during my internship at Visa Research, and also for his skills at the pool and ping-pong tables during our breaks.
Mar 25, 2024	Started my postdoc at SandboxAQ in London after spending a memorable 6+ years at ETH Zürich! (The flag is still a big plus, kinda.)
Dec 11, 2023	Successfully defended my doctoral thesis “Generic Enhancements of Post-Quantum Public-Key Encryption”. Many thanks to my advisor, Kenny, co-examiners Dennis and Andreas, the Applied Cryptography Group, my friends (not mutually exclusive with the aforementioned folks), and family for being an essential part of my doctoral journey!