Preface to the First Annual MathCrypt Proceedings Volume.

In 2017, we decided to start the annual series of MathCrypt Workshops in order to encourage more mathematicians and computational number theorists to propose and work on hard problems in cryptography. In fact, a Program Officer from NSF spoke at the first MathCrypt workshop in August and encouraged participants to apply to the NSF SaTC program for potential support for their research. The founders of MathCrypt, Jung Hee Cheon and Kristin Lauter, acted as Program Chairs, and were joined by Jintai Ding to form the Organizing Committee. [Extracted from the article]