Keno Goertz
Research Associate
NameKeno Goertz
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Chair of Privacy and Security
Chair of Privacy and Security
Visiting address:
Andreas-Pfitzmann-Bau, Room 3064 Nöthnitzer Str. 46
01187 Dresden
My Research and Thesis Topics
My research focuses on timestamps in distributed systems. Digital timestamps verifiably link data to a specific time. They are an important mechanism for ensuring data integrity and are used in a variety of applications, such as payment systems, certificate transparency, audit trails, and patent law. Traditionally, a trusted, centralized timestamp authority was responsible for issuing timestamps. However, protocols now exist that issue verifiable timestamps without a trusted third party. Many distributed systems use timestamps as one component among many.
The precise role of timestamps in the security of such systems is not always clear. For example, many blockchains use timestamps, while research is lacking into the extent to which these can be manipulated by attackers and what specific attacks such manipulation would enable. The implications of participants in a timestamp service using NTP to synchronize their clocks are also largely unexplored. Part of my research focuses on clarifying these questions.
Another part of my research explores new applications of timestamps. Distributed timestamp services offer an alternative for some of the use cases of consensus protocols. In traditional consensus protocols, all (honest) participants reach a consensus on the overall state of the system. In some cases, however, it is sufficient to use timestamps to determine which of two events occurred first, without requiring every participant to be aware of all events in the system. In such cases, distributed timestamp services could be a building block for a resource-efficient alternative to consensus protocols.
If this topic interests you and you are interested in writing your thesis with me, please feel free to email me at . You can also try to catch me in my office at APB 3064, but my office hours there are rather irregular.