Minutes of the Membership Meeting at Eurocrypt 2001

Business Meeting
Eurocrypt 2001
Innsbruck
9 May 2001

IACR President McCurley began the meeting at 16:10.

McCurley began by welcoming attendees to the Business meeting and
describing the history and mission of the IACR.  He noted that the IACR
is a non-profit association that was founded in 1983 and that its
purpose is to advance both the theory and practice of cryptologic
research.  He indicated the organization had approximately 1,000
members.

McCurley then described various activities of the IACR including the
annual Eurocrypt, Crypto, and Asiacrypt conferences, the Journal of
Cryptology, the IACR Newsletter, the web site at http://www.iacr.org,
and the ePrint Archive.

McCurley then individually introduced the Officers and Directors of the
IACR.

Next, McCurley described the elections that would be held in the fall of
2001.  He noted that all four IACR Officer positions (President,
Vice-President, Secretary, and Treasurer) and three additional Director
positions (those currently held by Biham, Diffie, and Landrock) would be
up for election of three-year terms to commence at the beginning of
2002.  McCurley introduced the Election Committee consisting of himself,
Balenson, and Desmedt, and he encouraged people to consider running for
positions on the IACR Board.

________________________________________________________________________

McCurley then invited Eurocrypt 2001 Program Chair Pfitzmann to the
podium while reminding the audience that IACR is a volunteer
organization that depends upon the efforts of its members.  He then
thanked Pfitzmann and awarded her a plaque in appreciation of her work
as Program Chair.  Applause was given by all.

McCurley then invited Eurocrypt 2001 General Chair Posch to the podium.
He thanked Posch and awarded him a plaque in appreciation of his work as
General Chair.  Applause was given by all.

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Treasurer Langford then gave a financial report.

She noted that the IACR was financially sound and listed financial
results for year 2000 IACR conferences.  She said that Eurocrypt 2000
had returned a $17,000 surplus on income of $221,000, that Crypto 2000
had returned a surplus of $46,000 on income of $236,000, and that
Asiacrypt 2000 had returned a surplus of $4,000 on income of $112,000.

Langford said that full costs for administrative services provided by
the IACR Secretariat had been paid.  She said that the IACR held
$203,000 in certificates of deposit, $150,000 in checking accounts, and
$175,000 in other accounts, and that the total reserves of the IACR
(after discounting liabilities) was approximately $350,000.

Langford then noted that the IACR does practice price discrimination by
providing subsidies to students (something felt to be of general benefit
to the community) and by charging higher fees for late registration
(since funds are needed well in advance of conferences).

She then noted that conferences are budgeted to break even.

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McCurley then told the audience that dues for the IACR are included in
conference registration costs and include the Journal of Cryptology and
access to membership services.  He said that dues were currently $80 and
noted that about 3/4 of this amount was used to pay for the Journal of
Cryptology.  He also noted that present year's dues pay for the
following year's membership in the IACR.

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McCurley then reported on the Journal of Cryptology in the absence of
Journal Editor Feigenbaum.

He said that the Journal was in good shape and encouraged members to
submit research papers.

He then noted that Feigenbaum's term as Journal Editor would be expiring
at the end of 2001 and solicited comments from the membership for a new
Editor-in-Chief.  He said that Feigenbaum had done a great job at a
thankless task.

Brian Snow asked what the current backlog for the Journal was, and
McCurley responded that it was about six months.

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Newsletter Editor Cachin then reported on the IACR Newsletter, web site,
and ePrint Archive.

He said that the Newsletter was published thrice annually and sent by
e-mail to IACR members and was also available at
http://www.iacr.org/newsletter.  He noted that the next issue would be
closing at the end of May and invited submissions to be sent to
newsletter@iacr.org.

Cachin then reported on the ePrint Archive.  He said that technical
reports, pre-prints, and full versions of papers were accepted without
refereeing and made available at http://eprint.iacr.org.

Rich Schroeppel noted that he had not received that Newsletter by
e-mail.

Cachin suggested that Schroeppel check to make certain that his correct
e-mail address was listed with his membership data.

Schroeppel then asked whether the ePrint Archive accepted editorials,
and Cachin replied that it did so long as they were technical.

Cachin then reminded the audience that the Newsletter is available on
the web and includes book reviews, conference announcements, job
announcements, and other information of interest to the community.

________________________________________________________________________

McCurley then announced details of upcoming IACR conferences.

Crypto 2001 is scheduled for 19-23 August 2001 in Santa Barbara.  The
General Chair is Dave Balenson, and the Program Chair is Joe Kilian.

Asiacrypt 2001 is scheduled for 9-13 December 2001 on the Gold Coast of
Australia.  The General Chair is Ed Dawson, and the Program Chair is
Colin Boyd.

Eurocrypt 2002 is scheduled for 28 April - 2 May, 2002 in Amsterdam, The
Netherlands.  The General Chair is Barry Schoenmakers, and the Program
Chair is Lars Knudsen.

Crypto 2002 is tentatively scheduled for the third week in August in
Santa Barbara.  The General Chair is Rebecca Wright, and the Program
Chair is Moti Yung.

Asiacrypt 2002 is tentatively scheduled for 1-5 December 2002 in
Queenstown, New Zealand.  The General Chair is Henry Wolfe, and the
Program Chair is Yuliang Zheng.

________________________________________________________________________

McCurley then told the audience that IACR membership services are
provided by the IACR Secretariat at UCSB and that personal information
can be updated by e-mailing iacrmem@iacr.org.

He noted that the Secretariat also handles registration for conferences
and mailing of the Journal of Cryptology.

________________________________________________________________________

Brian Snow said that most conferences don't bill in advance and
questioned why this was done at IACR conferences.  Langford replied that
the IACR had already paid deposits to hotels for Eurocrypt 2002 but
promised to look into this with the UCSB where the billing is done.
Snow asserted that he had had to register late because had he registered
normally he would have been charged before the conference and before he
could obtain reimbursement.  Diffie suggested that one's sponsoring
agency might be able to pay the bill directly, and McCurley noted that
the credit card charge appears as "University of California" which might
be confusing to some.

________________________________________________________________________


McCurley then reported on the IACR Board decision to provide sponsorship
of future FSE workshops.

He noted that a proposal was made by the FSE Steering Committee and
approved by the IACR Board.

Diffie noted that this had taken place after more debate than any other
subject.

McCurley said that the IACR would assume financial responsibility for
FSE as of 2002, that the FSE Steering Committee would run the actual
workshop, and that copyrights for FSE proceedings would be assigned to
the IACR.

Berson noted the use of the term "workshop" rather than "conference".

Markus Dichtl asked what FSE is.  Biham responded by listing several
members of the FSE Steering Committee including himself, Knudsen,
Matsui, Preneel, Massey, and Vaudenay and said that this was FSE's first
Program Committee plus several additional members.

Dichtl asked about the process of sponsorship.  McCurley responded that
FSE workshops would be approved by the IACR Board on an annual basis.
McCurley then noted that other workshops have also sought this
sponsorship and that this strains the resources of the IACR, but that
the FSE Steering Committee is extremely well-run.

Schroeppel then asked if it was the intent of FSE workshops to break
even, and McCurley responded that this was the case to the extent
possible.  McCurley noted that IACR budgets conservatively for the
number of expected attendees.

Diffie noted that FSE broke even in 1999, turned a small surplus in
2000, and that numbers for 2001 were not yet known.

________________________________________________________________________

McCurley then asked for a straw poll from the audience about how many
people would NOT use on-line registration because of privacy, security,
or other concerns.  Approximately nine hands were raised in the audience
of approximately one hundred.

Schroeppel said that he had had mixed experiences with on-line
transactions.

Desmedt noted that processing could be less expensive.

Hilarie Orman requested that this NOT be done using JavaScript.

Brian Snow said that he assumed that on-line registration would be
optional, and McCurley responded that it would be.

McCurley also noted that database management might be easier
electronically.

Snow suggested that e-mail could solve this concern.

McCurley then asked how many members would use on-line tools to manage
their IACR records.  Almost all of the audience members raised their
hands.

Clark noted that IACR incurs approximately $6,000 in annual mailing
costs and asked whether members liked the idea of sending registration
by e-mail.  Almost all of the audience members raised their hands in
approval.

Snow requested that e-mail registration forms be supplied in both a
basic ASCII format and a "pretty" format.

Greg Rose noted that a lack of paper registration forms makes
distribution to colleagues more difficult.

McCurley suggested that there were trade-offs.

Mike Wiener asked if such a service could be used to obtain membership
information.  McCurley responded that it would not in order to prevent
"crawling" to access personal data.  McCurley suggested that this site
would be password protected and would only be used to facilitate update
of records.

________________________________________________________________________

At 16:52, McCurley opened the floor for other business.

Rose noted to members that the airline code for the Gold Coast of
Australia is "OOL".  Dawson then noted that busses and trains are
available from Brisbane.

Orman asked about a possible update to the IACR conference CD-ROM.
McCurley responded that the previous CD-ROM had sold out but that
Springer-Verlag may reprint it.  In response to the issue of an update,
McCurley said that the CD-ROM was currently full, but that
Springer-Verlag now had all conferences on-line and that the IACR is
working to make access available to all of its members.  Orman described
the CD-ROM as a vital resource and suggested rolling the content.
McCurley said that he felt that rolling was a good idea, but that
Springer-Verlag would prefer to give electronic access.  Orman expressed
the concern that electronic access would be cumbersome.

Orman then suggested that there be some accommodation made to accept
short papers at one or more of the IACR annual conferences.  McCurley
responded that the rump sessions serve some of this function and that
the Program Chairs have wide discretion.  Desmedt added that previous
IACR conferences have had varying talk lengths and that this was
upsetting to authors.  Orman expressed the view that this should not be
upsetting if pre-arranged.  McCurley asked for a sense of the audience,
and about a dozen members expressed support for a short paper category.
Niels Ferguson asked if there was a good outlet for short papers, and
Cachin suggested that they be submitted to the ePrint Archive.
Schroeppel asked what provisions existed for a record of the rump
sessions, and Diffie responded that varying accommodations have been
made in the past.  Schroeppel then asked who holds the copyright on the
Journal of Cryptology, and McCurley responded that copyright is held by
the IACR.

A member then asked about details for Eurocrypt 2003, and McCurley said
that an announcement would be made when details were finalized.

Orman then noted that there is much good crypto-related material
available on the web and suggested that the IACR could perform a service
by collating this material.  McCurley responded that Avi Ruben has built
such an index, and said that it might be useful for the IACR to do
something similar but that it would require significant maintenance.
Brian Snow observed that the NSA provides similar services for U.S.
universities.

A member asked whether the IACR intends to include Asiacrypt conference
proceedings on a CD-ROM, and McCurley replied that at the time the
CD-ROM was assembled, only Eurocrypt and Crypto were IACR conferences.
McCurley then said that if an update to the CD-ROM was done, then such
an addition might be possible.

Markus Dichtl expressed an objection to the fact that payment for
Eurocrypt was done in U.S. dollars rather than euros and noted that IACR
risks currency fluctuation in doing so.  McCurley responded that the
IACR takes a risk either way since a significant portion of the
Eurocrypt expenditures are in U.S. dollars and noted that the euro does
not apply in non-eurozone nations.  Langford added that U.S. banks are
limited in their world view and that she was not willing to spend an
unlimited amount of time on the issue.  Langford said that she has been
told that Visa and MasterCard require payments through UCSB to be in
U.S. dollars.  Langford then added that having a non-U.S. bank account
adds burdens but that she is working on this while noting that currently
fluctuations have generally been small.  McCurley added that payments
through UCSB allow consistency, control, and fiscal integrity and then
asked how many people were irritated by the U.S. dollar payments.  Nine
members raised their hands to indicate their irritation.  [Note, UCSB
charges the IACR a substantially lower fee for credit card payments than
would be obtained independently (about 2% versus 4%).  This 2%
differential represents a significant savings for the IACR.]

Clark then noted that the priorities of the IACR include some costly
items and that approximately $25 of member dues go to support these
costs.  Niels Ferguson suggested that we evaluate potential benefits
before investing.

Desmedt asked in what currency the Journal of Cryptology is paid for.
Langford replied that the Journal is paid for in U.S. dollars but that
the conference proceedings are paid for in German deutschmarks.

A member asked if it would be possible to include a CD-ROM with each
proceedings.  McCurley responded that this was a low priority and then
asked how many members would pay an extra $10 for a CD-ROM with the
proceedings.  Most members indicated that they would be willing to pay
the extra $10.  McCurley noted that a CD-ROM alone would cause a V.A.T.
to be added and that it was therefore valuable to bundle the CD-ROM with
printed proceedings.  Ferguson suggested including a CD-ROM with the
entire most recent year of IACR conference proceedings.  McCurley
estimated that this would cost approximately $10 per copy.

The meeting was adjourned at 17:19.

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Respectfully submitted
Josh Benaloh
IACR Secretary