He was a pioneer of threshold cryptography[1] and is an International Association for Cryptologic Research Fellow.

He also made crucial observations that were used in the cryptanalysis of the Merkle–Hellman knapsack cryptosystem[2] and observed properties of the Data Encryption Standard which were used by Eli Biham and Adi Shamir when they invented differential cryptanalysis.

[3] Desmedt received his M.Sc in electrical engineering from the University of Leuven, Belgium in 1979.

[4] Desmedt has been the Jonsson Distinguished Professor in the Department of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Dallas,[4] USA since August 2012.

In addition he is also been Chair of Information Communication Technology in the Department of Computer Science at University College London, since August 2004.