An Eye for Solutions: Cryptography Feeds Engineer’s Passion for Puzzles Using AI

Imagine being one of the newcomers—and one of the youngest engineers in your department—and identifying an error that puts at risk the systems it’s designed to protect.

One of MITRE’s youngest cyber professionals is gaining kudos for her innovative algorithmic detective work.

Lauren Brandt, 25, played a pivotal role in a 2023 Intelligence Community sponsor's post-quantum cryptography project by identifying an error in a new algorithm published by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). As part of her project work, Brandt wrote the code for an algorithm using NIST’s non-standardized specifications.

"I was looking for errors because the sponsor expected there would be some there,” she says. “Actually, everyone was looking for errors—it was open for public review at that point. It was a small thing to find, but you could say that I caught it in the rough draft stage.”

After spotting the error, Brandt was "excited that I had enough knowledge to actually be able to pinpoint something that was an issue."

After running her findings by senior MITRE technical staff, Brandt submitted her response to NIST. "I had only been at MITRE full time for a year at that point, and I was a bit less confident because I'm so young. But they had no idea of my age—all they knew was my affiliation because of my MITRE email address, and that I had spelled out all of the math for them."

Her discovery led to a revision in the specification before its final publication. Had the error not been caught, Brandt acknowledges that “the functions of the algorithm would have created confusion, but you could have worked around it.”

Calculating a Cyber Future

Brandt came to MITRE in 2021 as an intern and returned with the Cyber New Professionals program in July 2022, shortly after receiving her master’s degree in mathematics from Arizona State University.

“A lot of people think ‘hacking’ when they hear ‘cybersecurity,’” she notes, but the cyber landscape is a broad one. Brandt’s lifelong love of math and solving puzzles led her to study cryptography, the practice of keeping information secure from those who want to access it. “You don’t often see cryptographers in movies or on TV pulling out the white boards! The work isn’t for everyone, and it’s often overlooked, but it’s very fun.”

Soon after joining the company full time, Brandt proposed a research project that explores the use of AI in protocol analysis to improve the overall protocol design process. Her research involves refining large language models to transcribe data protocols from natural language into a MITRE software tool that helps to design and analyze of cryptographic protocols.

For example, Brandt leaned into learning Cryptol, a particularly challenging language for specifying cryptographic algorithms. Cryptol gives protocol designers and implementors an easy way to keep information secure as it’s being sent from one party to another.

Thriving in a Culture of Knowledge Sharing

“People at MITRE are excited about research, and it’s been incredible to have great mentors who are invested in me and my work,” says Brandt, who is currently a member of our Cyber for Identity Trust & Assurance department. “I’ve learned how to lead a research project—everything from proposing an idea to managing the funding and developing and executing the research plan.

“I’m so fortunate to be doing something technical that I love,” she adds. “I really want to continue finding work here that I love to do, maybe more individual research projects, sponsor research, or other internal MITRE projects. I’m very content; I’m keeping all the doors open.”