Cryptography, the analysis and construction of secret codes, has long been important to governments, and has become big business since the explosion of commerce on the Internet. In 1985, Professor Neal Koblitz, a UW number theorist, and Victor Miller, then at IBM, discovered a new system of cryptography that is much more secure than previously known systems. Their system is based on elliptic curves, which are curves defined by certain polynomial equations that play a central role in abstract number theory and algebraic geometry. Professor Koblitz continues to make major contributions to the theory of elliptic curve cryptography, and serves as an advisor to Certicom Corporation, the leading commercial provider of elliptic curve cryptographic systems.