Tal Rabin

Tal Rabin
Tal Rabin
Born	1962; Massachusetts, United States
Occupation(s)	Computer scientist, professor
Years active	1994–present
Known for	Cryptography, network security, digital signature schemes, secret sharing techniques

Tal Rabin (; born 1962) is a distinguished computer scientist serving as a Professor of Computer and Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania and holding a leadership role at Amazon Web Services (AWS). Previously, she directed research at the Algorand Foundation and headed the cryptography research division at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center.

Biography

Born in Massachusetts and raised in Jerusalem, Israel, Rabin is the daughter of prominent computer scientist Michael O. Rabin, noted for his seminal contributions to computability and cryptography. The two have collaborated on various scholarly works. She is also a mother to two daughters.

Career

Rabin completed her BSc in 1986, MSc in 1988, and PhD in 1994 at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, under the mentorship of Professor Michael Ben-Or. Between 1994 and 1996, she was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship by the National Science Foundation at MIT. She subsequently joined IBM’s cryptography group at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center, assuming leadership of the team in 1997. In 2020, she accepted the position of Rachleff Family Professor of Computer and Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania.

Her research expertise lies primarily in cryptography and network security, with emphasis on developing efficient and secure encryption methods, robust distributed protocols, and foundational theories encompassing number theory and distributed computing systems. Rabin has contributed over 100 research articles and holds five patents registered in the United States. Among her notable achievements are digital signature schemes vital for secure internet communications and innovative secret sharing techniques, often developed in partnership with scholars such as Rosario Gennaro and Hugo Krawczyk.

Rabin has actively participated on program committees for premier cryptography conferences including TCC, Crypto, PKC, and Eurocrypt. Her service record includes membership on the council of the Computing Community Consortium from 2013 to 2016, executive committee involvement with SIGACT between 2012 and 2015, and editorial duties for the Journal of Cryptology. She co-established the Women in Theory Workshop, a biennial event designed to support graduate students pursuing theoretical computer science. Additionally, she promotes public awareness of encryption technologies through engagement at forums such as the World Science Festival (2011) and WNYC Science Fair (2014).

Awards

2014: Recognized by Business Insider as one of the top 22 most influential women engineers worldwide

2014: Honored with the Woman of Vision for innovation by the Anita Borg Institute

2015: Inducted as an IACR Fellow (International Association for Cryptologic Research)

2016: Elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

2017: Awarded ACM Fellowship

2018: Featured among America's Top 50 Women In Tech by Forbes

2019: Recipient of the prestigious RSA Award for Excellence in Mathematics

2023: Earned the Dijkstra Prize recognizing her significant contributions to secure multiparty computation (MPC)

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