This page lists some potential projects in the DEDIS lab that may be available next semester. Please first read the general guidelines for projects in the DEDIS lab, then use ONLY the following form to get in touch with us:
Get in touch:
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For examples of reports, presentations, and code resulting from past projects please see these pages: 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016
List of projects updated Dec 8th 2021.
(assigned) Anonymous Proof-of-Presence Groups for Messaging, Voting and Digital Currency
For up to 10 bachelor/master students
Abstract
Popular communication tools today use either require semi-strong but privacy-invasive identities such as phone numbers to achieve some level of accountability and Sybil attack protection (e.g., WhatsApp or Signal), while other tools use weak identities such as E-mail addresses or pseudonymous public keys (e.g., Bitcoin) but lose any fair, “person-centric” form of accountability or Sybil attack protection. The DEDIS lab is developing a new, human-centric “proof-of-personhood” (PoP) solution to this problem leveraging physical presence at real-world events to provide privacy-preserving but accountable, Sybil-protected identities.
This project will prototype a minimalistic but highly robust and usable proof-of-presence group communication app for mobile devices. The app will enable anyone to organize an in-person event, and take a secure “roll-call” at that event to connect with attendees and give each a one-per-person digital membership token. With these tokens, attendees can message each other, participate in an election or exchange currency without needing any strong identities (phone numbers etc), but with the ability to hold all participants accountable.
Contact: Pierluca Borsò
(assigned) D-Voting – Engineering a Production-Ready System for an e-voting platform
For 1-2 students (bachelor/master)
Abstract
The DEDIS lab is developing its next-generation e-voting platform based on the Dela blockchain. The actual system is currently used for some election processes at EPFL and the new system (d-voting), started one year ago, should eventually replace the actual one.
The goal of this project is to improve the system’s maturity and bring it close to production-readiness. As you will discover, there is a huge gap between a system that can run on the developper’s machine and one that can be ultimately deployed in production. To support you in this endeavour, you will be closely supervised by an engineer experienced in the development of testing frameworks and one or more short workshops may be organized to provide you with some foundations in software quality assurance.
Keywords: e-voting, blockchain, golang, production system
Contact: Noémien Kocher
(assigned) D-Voting – Front-end development for an e-voting platform
For 1-2 students (bachelor/master)
Abstract
The DEDIS lab is developing its next-generation e-voting platform based on the Dela blockchain. The actual system is currently used for some election processes at EPFL and the new system (d-voting), started one year ago, should eventually replace the actual one. D-voting has two main parts: The backend part, which includes the blockchain nodes and the election logic, and a front-end, which is used by voters and administrators to interact with the system: manage elections, cast votes, get voting results, etc…
The goal of this project is to work on the front-end part and implement a new authorization tool to manage access on the e-voting platform. Part of the project is also to improve the overall front-end. To be successful, students must be familiar with common web technologies such as javascript, react, html, and CSS. Aside from the required technology skills, students should have a good sense of aesthetic and design (indicate your relevant experience and results in those domains when you apply).
Contact: Noémien Kocher
(assigned) Livos-sec – Secured Liquid Voting System
For 1 master student (cyber security)
Liquid voting is an extended form of voting that allows individuals to delegate their votes. It combines direct democracy with representative democracy and proved to offer better decision and information aggregation. We are particularly interested in web-based open-audit systems that use a decentralized approach with no single point of failure, such as the popular Helios system. While voting delegation is already available in some online voting systems, no solutions seem to offer a true, liquid, secured, and interaction-free voting system. For instance, the popular liquid version of Helios only supports an “all-or-nothing” delegation, with the necessity of a side channel to delegate a vote.
The goal of this project is to first identify the limitations of the current “liquid-enabled” online voting system, design the desired properties of an online liquid voting system, and come up with novel solutions to tackle those limitations. The designed solutions can take advantage of the d-voting and Livos projects conducted recently by the lab.
Contact: Noémien Kocher