ZKProof 5.5 in Barcelona was a blast! We focused on standardization,and all the 100 participants, well, participated! :slightly_smiling_face:

Here’s summary of the talks, for those who couldn’t make it, but also as reference for the workgroups we formed.

 

Peter illuminated a promising new paradigm for efficient zero-knowledge proofs using VOLE-in-the-head (slides are here). With crisp clarity, he mapped out how this novel approach builds on the VOLE tool from multi-party computation to enable simple, high-performance proofs with minimal cryptographic assumptions. His articulate explanations revealed the power of VOLE for building homomorphic commitments, as well as the elegance of making interactive VOLE proofs non-interactive. Peter presented the FAEST signature scheme, which achieves similar performance to hash-based signatures under only AES security, and provides post-quantum signatures under 5KB and fast signing/verification.

VOLE Functionality: 

  • VOLE allows a prover to commit to a vector that the verifier can evaluate. This provides a linearly homomorphic commitment scheme.
  • Peter demonstrated how VOLE commitments can be used for circuit proofs, with local operations for linear gates and simple techniques for proving multiplications.

VOLE-in-the-Head:

  • The prover secret shares the witness and converts the shares into a set of VOLE inputs.
  • A challenge from the verifier determines which commitments to open, allowing verification.This approach is far more efficient than heavy MPC computation.Advantages:
  • Simplicity of constructions make VOLE proofs easy to explain and implement.
  • High performance for prover as computations use VOLE commitments.
  • Minimal cryptographic assumptions, just symmetric primitives.
  • Concrete overhead as low as 10-16 bits per AND gate.Application to Signatures:
  • Peter presented the FAEST signature scheme using VOLE proofs of AES computation.
  • Achieves similar performance to hash-based signatures under only AES security.
  • Signatures under 5KB and fast signing/verification.
  • Overall, Peter made a compelling case for exploring VOLE-in-the-head as a new paradigm for simple and practical zero-knowledge proofs, opening up potential new applications.