Sam Jaques
@sejaques.bsky.social
Assistant prof at U Waterloo. Aspiring full-stack cryptographer. Loves math, plants, flashcards. Opinions reflect those of all past, present, and future employers.
I love my city youtu.be/uttoyAX4ntc?...
How This Small City Built Light Rail For Cheap
YouTube video by Oh The Urbanity!
youtu.be
September 24, 2025 at 11:10 PM
I love my city youtu.be/uttoyAX4ntc?...
Reposted by Sam Jaques
The impact of Alfred Menezes in cryptography is profound. Francisco RH and I are organizing an afternoon session in Latincrypt to celebrate Alfred's career:
menezesfest.info
If you're coming to Medellín, consider attending!
menezesfest.info
If you're coming to Medellín, consider attending!
MenezesFest 2025
MenezesFest brings together researchers, colleagues, and friends to celebrate the career and impact of Alfred Menezes.
menezesfest.info
September 18, 2025 at 6:17 AM
The impact of Alfred Menezes in cryptography is profound. Francisco RH and I are organizing an afternoon session in Latincrypt to celebrate Alfred's career:
menezesfest.info
If you're coming to Medellín, consider attending!
menezesfest.info
If you're coming to Medellín, consider attending!
Always bothers me when you lose the 1/N factor in a multi-user security proof. Was thinking about how to dodge it; consider this for Schnorr signatures: you are an active adversary against a single challenger, with access to a multi-user adversary.
September 3, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Always bothers me when you lose the 1/N factor in a multi-user security proof. Was thinking about how to dodge it; consider this for Schnorr signatures: you are an active adversary against a single challenger, with access to a multi-user adversary.
Reposted by Sam Jaques
I wrote a bit about options for phones at protests, explaining the benefits and drawbacks, and added some security tips at the end.
Options for Phones at Protests
Simply showing up to a protest leaves you susceptible to all sorts of surveillance, including cameras, drones, facial recognition, and more. There's not always a lot you can do about pernicious street...
blog.yaelwrites.com
September 3, 2025 at 2:01 AM
I wrote a bit about options for phones at protests, explaining the benefits and drawbacks, and added some security tips at the end.
Reposted by Sam Jaques
Ursula K. LeGuin on technology
January 13, 2025 at 1:53 PM
Ursula K. LeGuin on technology
An out-of-schedule update to my quantum landscape chart: sam-jaques.appspot.com/quantum_land..., prompted by
@craiggidney.bsky.social 's new paper: arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917.
A startling jump (20x) in how easy quantum factoring can be!
Also: much improved web design!
@craiggidney.bsky.social 's new paper: arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917.
A startling jump (20x) in how easy quantum factoring can be!
Also: much improved web design!
June 19, 2025 at 6:52 PM
An out-of-schedule update to my quantum landscape chart: sam-jaques.appspot.com/quantum_land..., prompted by
@craiggidney.bsky.social 's new paper: arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917.
A startling jump (20x) in how easy quantum factoring can be!
Also: much improved web design!
@craiggidney.bsky.social 's new paper: arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917.
A startling jump (20x) in how easy quantum factoring can be!
Also: much improved web design!
Seriously embarrassed myself in front of my cat: Middle of the night, cat sits there wanting pets. I can't see a thing, I reach out and try to pet a dirty pair of shorts.
June 9, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Seriously embarrassed myself in front of my cat: Middle of the night, cat sits there wanting pets. I can't see a thing, I reach out and try to pet a dirty pair of shorts.
Reposted by Sam Jaques
I'm often asked if I'll redo the 2019 quantum factoring estimate. Denser storage by yokes, smaller magic factories by cultivation, slimmer approx arithmetic by Chevignard et al… surely the cost is lower now?
Yes, it's lower now.
security.googleblog.com/2025/05/trac...
arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917
Yes, it's lower now.
security.googleblog.com/2025/05/trac...
arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917
May 23, 2025 at 1:25 PM
I'm often asked if I'll redo the 2019 quantum factoring estimate. Denser storage by yokes, smaller magic factories by cultivation, slimmer approx arithmetic by Chevignard et al… surely the cost is lower now?
Yes, it's lower now.
security.googleblog.com/2025/05/trac...
arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917
Yes, it's lower now.
security.googleblog.com/2025/05/trac...
arxiv.org/abs/2505.15917
Almost all good points. I also see too much tendency to conflate moral skepticism of AI (i.e., that AI is doing a lot of harm) with technical skepticism (i.e., that AI is not useful or powerful)
June 3, 2025 at 2:43 PM
Almost all good points. I also see too much tendency to conflate moral skepticism of AI (i.e., that AI is doing a lot of harm) with technical skepticism (i.e., that AI is not useful or powerful)
Dang, AI is really making the Internet suck
May 1, 2025 at 9:05 AM
Dang, AI is really making the Internet suck
Reposted by Sam Jaques
"If you want to prompt ChatGPT 40 times, you can just stop your shower 1 second early."
"If I choose not to take a flight to Europe, I save 3,500,000 ChatGPT searches. this is like stopping more than 7 people from searching ChatGPT for their entire lives."
"If I choose not to take a flight to Europe, I save 3,500,000 ChatGPT searches. this is like stopping more than 7 people from searching ChatGPT for their entire lives."
April 29, 2025 at 3:31 PM
"If you want to prompt ChatGPT 40 times, you can just stop your shower 1 second early."
"If I choose not to take a flight to Europe, I save 3,500,000 ChatGPT searches. this is like stopping more than 7 people from searching ChatGPT for their entire lives."
"If I choose not to take a flight to Europe, I save 3,500,000 ChatGPT searches. this is like stopping more than 7 people from searching ChatGPT for their entire lives."
My biggest threat model for my online accounts is that I will be in another place, with the wrong sim, or my phone falls in the ocean, and I will need access to an absolutely essential piece of documentation. Single-factor authentication saves me.
With that said, there’s one feature that’s incredibly useful about passwords — something that email codes and passkeys have all failed to duplicate.
You can write your password down, or text it to a family member.
You can write your password down, or text it to a family member.
April 30, 2025 at 8:59 AM
My biggest threat model for my online accounts is that I will be in another place, with the wrong sim, or my phone falls in the ocean, and I will need access to an absolutely essential piece of documentation. Single-factor authentication saves me.
I actually learned an embarrassing amount from this episode securitycryptographywhatever.com/2025/03/23/p...
Picking Quantum Resistant Algorithms
Migrating the US government to quantum-resistant cryptography is hard, luckily the gamer presidents are on it. This episode is extremely not safe for work, n...
securitycryptographywhatever.com
April 18, 2025 at 7:27 PM
I actually learned an embarrassing amount from this episode securitycryptographywhatever.com/2025/03/23/p...
Reposted by Sam Jaques
On the anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, we thought we'd answer a question that's often asked,
"If they raised the Mary Rose, why not raise the Titanic?"
Allow our scaled diagram to explain...
"If they raised the Mary Rose, why not raise the Titanic?"
Allow our scaled diagram to explain...
April 15, 2025 at 8:21 AM
On the anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, we thought we'd answer a question that's often asked,
"If they raised the Mary Rose, why not raise the Titanic?"
Allow our scaled diagram to explain...
"If they raised the Mary Rose, why not raise the Titanic?"
Allow our scaled diagram to explain...
I think cities should red team their building codes and hire a contractor to build the most unhinged home that is technically up to code
April 5, 2025 at 2:18 AM
I think cities should red team their building codes and hire a contractor to build the most unhinged home that is technically up to code
Spooky thought: most job markets implicitly assume there are at least as many entry level jobs as senior jobs, so that people can get the experience they need to do the senior jobs. But if you can cheaply replace the entry level workers with AI, the balance could flip
Hello friends. The dreaded and long awaiting blog on WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED TO THE CYBERSECURITY JOBS MARKET has arrived.
tisiphone.net/2025/04/01/l...
I'm sorry.
tisiphone.net/2025/04/01/l...
I'm sorry.
Lesley, What Happened to the “Cybersecurity Skills Shortage”?
Are you stressed out right now? I’m stressed out. Most Americans are, and cybersecurity job seekers are definitely not an exception. I do a ton of career mentoring and career clinics, and I s…
tisiphone.net
April 2, 2025 at 5:09 PM
Spooky thought: most job markets implicitly assume there are at least as many entry level jobs as senior jobs, so that people can get the experience they need to do the senior jobs. But if you can cheaply replace the entry level workers with AI, the balance could flip
Had a student on a project to do some simulation analysis of errors in Shors algorithm but we hit this problem: how do you even know when things went right, if random noise can factor just as well?
The catch is that Shor's algorithm is too easy for small numbers. It works fast even if you replace the quantum computer with a random number generator. And the circuits I was giving to the computer are enormous; far larger than its error rate allowed. I forced it to be a random number generator.
April 2, 2025 at 4:58 PM
Had a student on a project to do some simulation analysis of errors in Shors algorithm but we hit this problem: how do you even know when things went right, if random noise can factor just as well?
Here's an argument against area-time cost, and instead for total operation cost: if large portions of a computer are idle during an algorithm, they could just be programmed to mine cryptocurrency instead, to recover costs for the attacker
March 29, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Here's an argument against area-time cost, and instead for total operation cost: if large portions of a computer are idle during an algorithm, they could just be programmed to mine cryptocurrency instead, to recover costs for the attacker
Reposted by Sam Jaques
Great article! Had no idea how insanely readable COBOL code was until now. Let alone the gendered/gatekeeping dynamics behind its historical denigration or modern downplaying of the number of active coders…
March 29, 2025 at 8:45 AM
Great article! Had no idea how insanely readable COBOL code was until now. Let alone the gendered/gatekeeping dynamics behind its historical denigration or modern downplaying of the number of active coders…
Reposted by Sam Jaques
This jibes with contemporary reporting that the raids hit several residential buildings, in each case killing about 15 people and wounding more. Maybe a little more of the conversation should be about how cavalier we apparently are about bombing civilian homes? www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/...
March 26, 2025 at 4:05 PM
This jibes with contemporary reporting that the raids hit several residential buildings, in each case killing about 15 people and wounding more. Maybe a little more of the conversation should be about how cavalier we apparently are about bombing civilian homes? www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/...
If Trump+Musk have taught us anything, it's that all press is good press. I fully expect these events to be good for Signal adoption long-term.
Sigh. Here we go again. It's really important that people are smart about this story re: Trump admin using Signal to discuss war plans.
The center-left media wants to make the story about Trump admin fucking up, which they did. But in the process they're falsely implying that Signal is "insecure."🧵
The center-left media wants to make the story about Trump admin fucking up, which they did. But in the process they're falsely implying that Signal is "insecure."🧵
March 26, 2025 at 12:33 PM
If Trump+Musk have taught us anything, it's that all press is good press. I fully expect these events to be good for Signal adoption long-term.
Opsec level: underfunded provincial museum
January 25, 2025 at 5:52 PM
Opsec level: underfunded provincial museum
Suddenly struck with a cursed analogy for memory management: a bunch of blind alien roommates sharing a fridge. Waterloo CS students are lucky I only teach math courses!
January 13, 2025 at 3:59 PM
Suddenly struck with a cursed analogy for memory management: a bunch of blind alien roommates sharing a fridge. Waterloo CS students are lucky I only teach math courses!