The successful candidate will perform fundamental and applied research on quantum-safe cryptographic security, privacy and trust aspects in distributed systems. These include computational hard immutability of distributed ledgers, short cryptographic attestations, secure data sharing and processing, and identity solutions. The research project will be part of a NWO consortium grant formed by the CWI Cryptology Group, the high performance distributed computing group at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the system and network engineering group at the University of Amsterdam with the aim to develop integrated solutions for distributed data processing.

You should hold a Master degree (or expect to obtain it soon) in mathematics or computer science (or a comparable subject) with excellent grades, and you should have successfully demonstrated your research abilities, e.g. by completion of an (undergraduate) research project with outstanding results. Furthermore, preferably, you:

• have some background in cryptography;
• possess good academic writing and presentation skills;
• are fluent in spoken and written English.

Your application should include the following information:

• a curriculum vitae;
• a letter of motivation (at most 1 page) explaining why you are interested in this position;
• a list of all university courses taken, including a transcript of grades;
• a report from an undergraduate research project (such as a MSc thesis) you have done;
• the name and contact details (including email address) of two to three referees who can provide details about your profile (one of whom should be the main supervisor of your Master thesis).

Fixed-term contract: 18 months.

The terms of employment are in accordance with the Dutch Collective Labour Agreement for Research Centres ("CAO-onderzoeksinstellingen"). The initial labour agreement will be for a period of 18 months. After a positive evaluation, the agreement will extended by 30 months. The gross monthly salary, for a PhD student on a full time basis, is €2,346 during the first year and increases to €3,007 over the four year period.

Employees are also entitled to a holiday allowance of 8% of the gross annual salary and a year-end bonus of 8.33%. CWI offers attractive working conditions, including flexible scheduling and help with housing for expat employees.

Please visit our website for more information about our terms of employment: https://www.cwi.nl/jobs/terms-of-employment

Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) is the Dutch national research institute for mathematics and computer science and is part of the Institutes Organisation of NWO. The mission of CWI is to conduct pioneering research in mathematics and computer science, generating new knowledge in these fields and conveying it to trade, industry, and society at large.

CWI is an internationally oriented institute, with 160 scientists from approximately 27 countries. The facilities are first-rate and include excellent IT support, career planning, training, and courses.

CWI is located at Science Park Amsterdam that is presently developing into a major location of research in the natural sciences in The Netherlands, housing the sciences of the University of Amsterdam and of the Vrije Universiteit as well as several other national research institutes next to CWI.

For information about the research group of Cryptology please visit the group page and watch their video.