All Questions

570 views

What algorithm would give the shortest ciphertext for very short plaintexts?

I have to encrypt some very short messages (approx. 5 characters) and I would like the ciphertext to be as short as possible. I am currently using AES but the initialization vector (IV) is making my ...
1k views

Hash function in PBKDF2

From this excellent answer I learned (correct me if I am wrong) that when writing a block cipher with say key size 128 bit, one has to pad the password given (variable size) so that it becomes exactly ...
260 views

LFSR dynamic mutation

In normal LFSR, the state is a function of the initial seed, taps positions and time, nothing else. I've seen a modification of LFSR that works like this: ...
445 views

Families of public/private keys in elliptic curve cryptography

I'm looking for a related key scheme for elliptic curve cryptography. The basic idea would be that there would be a master public key and a master private key. From the master public key, you could ...
1k views

I'm working on implementing a cryptographic system and I'm trying to understand the Zero Knowledge Password Proof concept. So here's some background: To generate a secret key I am: Doing an ECDH ...
1k views

Brute forcing CRC-32

I'm working on a cryptosystem which uses IDEA. The designer made the mistake of including a CRC-32B hash of the password unencrypted in the header, so that the system can quickly reject bad ...
343 views

How can two different passphrases unlock the same content?

I have heard that in enterprises it is common that the IT admin has a master passphrase that can unlock any content that an employee encrypts. It would be temping to think, that the IT admin's ...
170 views

How to calculate inverse affine transform in AES from forward affine transform?

In AES the forward affine tranformation matrix is defined as:  \begin{bmatrix} 1& 0& 0& 0& 1& 1& 1& 1 \\ 1& 1& 0& 0& 0& 1& 1& 1 \\ 1& ...
159 views

Should HMAC or NMAC or plain Keccak be used for a secure MAC?

After some digging around in the HMAC spec I found this (paraphrased): Step 1: If the length of Key equals the block size of the hash function (512 bits/64 Bytes for SHA-256), set the key equal ...
168 views

Difference between lightweight, online and low memory Authenticated Encryption schemes

What is the basic difference between the following types of Authenticated Encryption (AE) schemes? Lightweight Authenticated encryption Online Authenticated Encryption Authenticated Encryption for ...
190 views

How can k3d3/ed25519-java's performance be improved?

I tried asking this on stackoverflow because I thought it might be a simple coding question and didn't want to clutter up this amazing stack, but I received no responses. CodesInChaos showed me that ...
803 views

In RSA, why is it important choosing e so that it is coprime to φ(n)?

When choosing the public exponent e, it is stressed that $e$ must be coprime to $\phi(n)$, i.e. $\gcd(\phi(n), e) = 1$. I know that a common choice is to have $e = 3$ (which requires a good padding ...
347 views

Elliptic Curve Encryption Ciphertext Size

I'd like to know how much bigger is the ciphertext when encrypting a message using ECC encrytpion? ECIES (or ElGamal)
176 views

Is there a cryptographic hash function that can be performed with pencil and paper?

Imagine I'm signing up for the 99th new web site this month. I somehow take my secret key (which I have written down on a card in my wallet) and the domain name of the site and feed them both into ...
235 views

Why is the discrete log problem easy when the exponent comes from a binomial distribution?

I read in http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/7219/2/esorics06.pdf that in exponential El Gamal the discrete log problem for recovering $m$ from $g^m$ can be made tractable when $m$ is drawn from a binomial ...
484 views

There have been several questions regarding password hashing here and on Security.SE. A "pepper" is sometimes mentioned – an application-specific secret key. The canonical answer on password hashing ...
308 views

Attacking historical ciphers methodology

It's more a theoretical question of how would you approach it. All you know about the ciphertext it's was generated with a historical cipher. The ciphertext appears to be random, BUT it's divided into ...
253 views

Are hash trees an alternative, quantum-resistant signature scheme which can replace RSA?

Can hash trees provide quantum resistant signatures to replace RSA for signing securely? What is the key size and how many times can we use same key?
132 views

iterated discrete log problem

Consider the following problem: given $g_1 \ldots g_i,h_1 \ldots h_i \in G$, $\forall i$ find $x_i$ such that $g_i^{x_i}=h_i$ For $i=1$ this is the discrete log problem and is assumed to to have ...
1k views

Cryptanalysis of Linear Feedback Shift Registers

It is well known that simple m-sequence linear feedback shift registers have a linear algebraic structure and therefore the generator seed can easily be deduced using the Berlekamp-Massey algorithm. ...
7k views

FIPS 140-2 Compliant Algorithms

Is there any reference to check the list of encryption & signing algorithms which are compliant to FIPS 140-2. After an exhaustive search I could find only "AES". Any suggestions would be much ...
743 views

Is it possible to pick your Ed25519 public key?

Is it possible to generate an Ed25519 keypair that has a very similar public key as another keypair (fooling a casual visual comparison) or is this as hard as solving one of SHA-512 or the discrete ...
243 views

What is the name of this kind of protocol

There is a communication protocol that I believe creates the equivalent of a one time pad, with the downside that the secret message must be transferred multiple times. The protocol is so simple that ...
1k views

Difficulty of breaking RSA for a given key size

Is it true that breaking a 1024-bit RSA key is as difficult as breaking a 128 bit symmetric key (e.g. AES)? I know that breaking a RSA key is equivalent to factoring the modulus $N$. To factor it, you ...
2k views

How to perform file encryption using 128-Bit AES?

I am confused, how can I encrypt a file using 128 Bit Advanced Encryption Standard? Do I need only to encrypt the file name and it's content or is there something that I need to do to encrypt it? Is ...
497 views

are CFB and OFB really meant for streaming?

CFB, OFB and other modes are meant for streaming and don't require padding. Are there still limitations such as the text needs to be greater than key length?
1k views

How can I break REDSHIRT / REDSHIRT2 encryption?

Recently, a user on Gaming.SE asked a question about whether the user password in the video game Uplink could be modified after being initially set. The game does not contain an option to change the ...
233 views

How is de-synchronisation of HOTP solved?

From RFC 4226 I understand how HOTP generates one-time passwords by incrementing a counter and uses the 'look-ahead' window to try to resynchronise (from this counter), if the user tries a few wrong ...
103 views

Is there an oblivious decryption scheme?

Alice has $K$; Bob has $E(K, m)$; Is there such a scheme that enables Alice decrypts $E(K, m)$ without knowing $m$, and Bob gets $m$ ?
104 views

Message lengths with AES CTR mode?

Im working on my own AES implementation as a personal educational exercise (not for production use), and a book im using as a resource states: In the case of CTR, we are merely XORing the output ...
184 views

SSL-like protocol with public-key hard-coded in the client

Imagine a SSL-like protocol that instead of using certificates signed by a trusted CA, has the server's public key hard-coded in the client. My question is: what happens if the server's private key is ...
2k views

HMAC-SHA1 vs HMAC-SHA256

I have three questions: Would you use HMAC-SHA1 or HMAC-SHA256 for message authentication? How much HMAC-SHA256 is slower than HMAC-SHA1? Are the security improvements of SHA256 (over SHA1) enough ...
226 views

Non-standard signature security definition conforming ed25519 malleability

According to the paper “High-speed high-security signatures”… Malleability. We also see no relevance of "malleability" to the standard definition of signature security. Aside from the example, ...
454 views

How do I test my encryption? (absolute amateur)

I am a hobby programmer with a background in biology and have developed an encryption program based on DNA. I tried to make it hard to crack, but it's essentially a substitution cipher and uses the ...
82 views

secret sharing of product of 2 numbers

Does evaluating the products of shares $a_jb_j$ give a secret sharing of $ab$? I think it's a no, but I am not sure on how to prove it.
211 views

Is OTP useful in modern electronic communication?

I have seen from time to time questions about various OTP schemes and "OTP" (i.e. stream cipher) schemes. The most common OTP troubles appear to be: How to extend size of previously generated key or ...
316 views

Decryption a chunk of file with AES

We are having a requirement to store large files (~1GB) encrypted and decrypt them when reading. We are looking to use AES-CTR or AES-GCM mode to encrypt the data. There are scenarios where we want to ...
323 views

Break double encryption

Let $E_k$ : {0,1}$^l$ be a block cipher encryption function with block-size $l$ and key-length $n$. In class, we saw that a double encryption with two independent keys $E{}'_{k_1k_2}(x)$ = ...
1k views

How can I use eulers totient and the chinese remainder theorem for modular exponentiation?

I'm trying to implement modular exponentiation in Java using Lagrange and the Chinese remainder theorem. The example we've been given is: Let $N = 55 = 5 · 11$ and suppose we want to compute ...
724 views

I'm doing some exercises before my exam, and I am stuck with task number 4 in this file: http://www.cs.umd.edu/~jkatz/crypto/f10/hw1.pdf Could you help me with this task? When using the one-time ...
995 views

Malleability attacks against encryption without authentication

Suppose there is a message that is encrypted with AES-128-CBC. The message is as follows, new lines are used to delimit the 16 byte boundary for each block: ...
309 views

Encryption with private key?

we normally always encrypt by public key and decrypt with private key. If i encrypt with private key, then its still secure as normal PKI ? i mean known-plain-text will not take private key on the ...
289 views

Is the Blum Blum Shub PRNG suitable to create initialization vectors?

Is it a good idea to use a Blum Blum Shub Generator to create my initialization Vector (IV) in AES-OFB (Output Feedback Mode)?
324 views

Sorry if this is a noob questions, but I finally figured out how to implement the Tiny Encryption Algorithm in C++. My question is what to do about padding the key and the plaintext? I know that ...
327 views

DGK Cryptosystem Encryption Speedup

Following @poncho's nice clarification of the RSA speedup here, let's see if I'm able to do the same in the case of the DGK cryptosystem: We have pk = (n, g, h, u), sk = (p, q, $v_p$, $v_q$) which ...
4k views

Cipher Feedback Mode

I can't understand what CFB really is. It said in Wikipedia that CFB is same as CBC, but I find that CFB is more difficult than CBC. Can someone explain to me how CFB works. Such as how ...
441 views

RSA finding the inverse of the public exponent

I have a very basic doubt in RSA key generation and its usage. In RSA key generation you choose two large prime numbers of a very large order. Then you multiply them.(eq $p \cdot q = N$) Now, ...
201 views

My question is related to PBKDF2. I am unsure how to validate user entered password with already existing hashes and salts. I have heard of the so called "length-constant" comparison which basically ...