Cryptography Researcher (Remote)

Nillion is a web3 infrastructure project based on a novel cryptographic innovation called Nil Message Compute (see presentation at Cambridge University). This new technology enables Information-Theoretic Secure decentralized data storage and computation.

As reported by TechCrunch, Nillion raised $25 million at a $180 million valuation in the midst of the bear market of 2022 - the highest valuation for a Seed Round reported in Q4-2022. The project has attracted some of the top talent in tech, including the Founding Engineer of Uber (Conrad Whelan), Founder of Indiegogo (Slava Rubin), Associate General Counsel of Coinbase (Lindsay Danas Cohen), Co-Founder of Hedera Hashgraph (Andrew Masanto) and several other high profile team members. The project has also won several industry awards, including the CoinList Seed Program (see CoinList Tweet here) and Polygon Co-Founder’s Web3 Accelerator Program, Beacon.

Nillion is bringing to life fast, permissionless, decentralized secure storage and private computation that fundamentally improves the way that data is processed, analyzed and shared. The protocol is looking for talented engineers to join its team in building that vision.

As a Cryptography Researcher at Nillion, you will research, design, and define cryptographic protocols within the larger framework of distributed systems, formally proving their security. You will be responsible for conducting groundbreaking research that will lead to commercially viable and reliable products by analyzing, proposing, and validating cryptography solutions within a decentralized computing environment.

We are a remote-first organization looking to build our team primarily focused on European and US East Coast time zones. Some travel may be required.

Requirements

• 5+ years of academic research experience in cryptography
• Qualified to a PhD or Postdoc degree in cryptography
• Several international scientific publications
• Deep understanding of MPC
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English
• Extensive experience working with internal and external stakeholders
• Have highly effective communication, interpersonal and critical thinking skills
• Ability to understand, formally describe and prove mathematical concepts in writing
• The ability to write formal security proofs in the UC framework
• Publications in the domain of MPC, ZKP or FHE

Responsibilities

• Developing new protocols and their security proofs
• Creating variants of existing protocols (synchronous/asynchronous, computational/ITS, passive/active, static/mobile adversaries, boolean/arithmetic, etc.)
• Verifying existing Nillion protocols and their security proofs
• Proof-reading existing written material (e.g. technical whitepaper)
• Writing new security proofs for existing Nillion  protocols
• Optimizing existing protocols for performance
• Giving internal presentations for educational purposes
• Participating in brainstorming sessions for new ideas

Benefits

We offer the following perks as part of employment with Nillion:

• Flexible working hours to accommodate lifestyles and a globally distributed team
• Competitive compensation package
• Make a big impact as a early contributor to an incredible founding team
• Work on new problems in an incredible emerging and dynamic field
• Learn from systems engineering, cryptography and product domain experts in a mentorship-oriented work culture
• You don’t need to be in an office or at a desk to have an impact anymore! We are fully remote, but value regular meet-ups.

In summary, if you are interested in web3 infrastructure, innovation, new technology, and are interested in working with a high-caliber team, please apply. Nillion is committed to shaping a better world in all that they do. Their global team is built based on respect, inclusivity, diversity and excellence.

For more information on either the technology or company, there are several lectures at leading universities about the project such as Oxford University, Cambridge University, New York University, Columbia, and MIT. You can also visit Nillion’s early website at www.nillion.com.