Progress in Cryptology - INDOCRYPT 2002 Third International Conference on Cryptology in India Hyderabad, India, December 16-18, 2002

The third successful completion of the INDOCRYPT conference series marks the acceptance of the series by the international research community as a forum for presenting high-quality research.It also marks the coming of age of cryptology research in India. The authors for the submitted papers were spread across 21 countries and 4 continents, which goes a long way to demonstrate the international interest and visibility of INDOCRYPT.In the previous two conferences, the submissions from India originated from only two institutes; this increased to six for the 2002 conference.Thus INDOCRYPT is well set on the path to achieving two main ob jectives – to provide an international platform for presenting high-quality research and to stimulate cryptology research in India. The opportunity to serve as a program co-chair for the third INDOCRYPT carries a special satisfaction for the second editor.Way back in 1998, the sci- ti?c analysis group of DRDO organized a National Seminar on Cryptology and abbreviated it as NSCR.On attending the seminar, the second editor suggested that the conference name be changed to INDOCRYPT.It is nice to see that this suggestion was taken up, giving us the annual INDOCRYPT conference - ries.Of course, the form, character, and execution of the conference series was the combined e?ort of the entire Indian cryptographic community under the dynamic leadership of Bimal Roy.