Scienceיעל טאומן קלעי

Yael Tauman Kalai

Yael Tauman Kalai is an Israeli cryptographer and theoretical computer scientist, known for co-inventing ring signatures and for her work on delegating computation.

Co-inventing ring signaturesDelegation of verifiable computationWeakness in the Fiat-Shamir heuristicLeakage-resilient cryptography

Occupation: computer scientist, cryptographer
Education: Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Weizmann Institute of Science

The story of Yael Tauman Kalai's life

Yael Tauman Kalai is the daughter of game theorist Yair Tauman. Her husband, Adam Tauman Kalai, is also a computer scientist.

She earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1997. She completed a master's degree at the Weizmann Institute of Science in 2001, working with Adi Shamir. In 2006 she finished a PhD at MIT under Shafi Goldwasser.

After postdoctoral work at Microsoft Research and the Weizmann Institute, she joined the faculty of the Georgia Institute of Technology. In 2008 she took a permanent position at Microsoft Research, and in 2024 she became a professor at MIT.

Her master's thesis introduced ring signatures, later used in systems such as Monero. With Shafi Goldwasser she showed a weakness in the Fiat-Shamir heuristic. Her work on delegating computation has uses in cloud computing.

She received the ACM Prize in Computing for 2022. That year she was also elected a Fellow of the International Association for Cryptologic Research.

Milestones in Yael Tauman Kalai's life

1997
Graduated from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
2001
Earned a master's degree at the Weizmann Institute of Science.
2006
Completed a PhD at MIT.
2008
Took a permanent position at Microsoft Research.
2017
Served as co-chair of the Theory of Cryptography Conference.
2018
Spoke as an invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians.
2022
Received the ACM Prize in Computing.
2024
Became a professor at MIT.