All Questions

2k views

I'm conducting an experiment dealing with differences in padding across different aes operations for my Intro to Crypto class, and the question says OpenSSL uses PKCS5 padding, and that I need to ...
194 views

Is there a way to encrypt multiple sets of data into one result, with separate keys decrypting each set of data

What I am picturing is something like this: Block A: "Hello, how are you today?" Block B: "The weather reminds me of summer." I encode this, giving me two keys and a resulting encrypted block e.g. ...
591 views

Is this scheme a provably fair random number generation?

I have thought up a method for generating random numbers between a client and a server which I hope is fair: The client and server decide on a range in advance, $0$ trough $n-1$. The server ...
336 views

Is this how padding can work?

So for block ciphers you need a fixed size block. If the plaintext length is not a multiple of the block length then you need to pad it. One way you could do this is that for the last block you just ...
438 views

Recovering SHA1 knowing 2/3 of the hash generated

I am doing some research on cryptography, so I generated a random string of numbers resembling a creditcard number(according to MOD10 validation) and encrypted it with SHA1 algorithm for encryption. ...
218 views

fixing WEP by treating all messages as one long stream

in the course of introduction to cryptography on coursera professor suggested treating all messages as a long stream XORing them with the key this way we will not need to change the key and will not ...
1k views

Are mouse movement coordinates useful as a seed for a RNG?

Is it good to use a mouse movement as a 64-bit random seed for a Pseudorandom Generator like AES in Counter Mode? Should I only need to get the X and Y coordinates of the mouse movement?
151 views

Cryptographical formalization of computational privacy

Yesteryears problems of communication privacy has been well defined in cryptography through Asymmetric cryptography. Due to rise in Cloud computational model , computational heavy tasks are being ...
140 views

Lightweight Asymmetric encryption algorithm

I'm an embedded systems researcher, and new in the crypto field. Actually, I need to know if there are any lightweight asymmetric encryption algorithm especially considering the time needed for key ...
82 views

How much stronger is RC4 if it is keyed with an RSA private key?

My idea is to generate a RSA 2048 bit key and use RC4 with the private RSA key to encrypt a stream of data. RC4 is weak because RC4 keys are small, 256-bit. But when we use RC4 with private RSA 2048 ...
72 views

What are the security implications of an AES implementation that uses only 8-bit byte operations on the cipher state?

Some AES implementations in crypto libraries make use only 8-bit byte operations on the cipher state, like in the lorawan-parser (cf lib/aes.h). When I try to understand the implications of that, I ...
82 views

How to convert RSA public keys to one key to use for text hashing?

I've recently asked a question about RSA encryption. One of the things that I don't understand is the usage of two public keys. In the example on Wikipedia, a message is encrypted like: ...
53 views

Does a padding oracle have the encryption key? Where in real life do I see such an oracle?

So after some searching, I kinda know the attack procedure of altering bit by bit. But I'm still confused how this is possible. If I understand it correctly, the attacker never has the key, or tries ...
57 views

What is the meaning of the overlapping region on OTP-perfect secrecy diagram?

I'm new to cryptography. I want to ask about OTP-perfect secrecy diagram like figure below: On the overlapping region (middle), notated by R(X;Y;Z). R can be calculated by I(X;Y) - I(X;Y|Z). That ...
50 views

ElGamal in $Z^*_{p^n}$

If $p$ is an odd prime and $n$ natural,it is known that the group $Z^*_{p^n}$ is cyclic.Explain why the selection-choice of the group $Z^*_{{3^{1000}}}$ for the construction of a cryptosystem ElGamal ...
177 views

Is this hypothetical key-exchange secure?

I've thought about the following (generic) key-agreement protocol. The only weaknesses I could have found are missing freshness guaranteees. As for the notions: $E^1_K(P)$ is the symmetric encryption ...
108 views

Which is the most secure steganography technique? [closed]

Just like we have AES in crypotography, which is the most secure technique in Steganography? I am looking for a technique in which the standard image characteristic modifications it does go ...
140 views

Encryption of exe file

I recently started learning cryptography. I have learned some basic stuff. I'm also started learning about pc security, so I was wondering how do hackers use cryptography for bypassing antivirus ...
45 views

what is recommended x length in Diffie Hellman algorithm

According to rfc documents http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2412#appendix-E.2 & http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3526#section-3, it has defined the prime and the ...
113 views

Pailler encryption of small integers to 32-bit integers

I want to encrypt very small integers in the range 0-44 using the Paillier cryptosystem. Is there a way to select p, ...
53 views

I have a question about decryption. Let's say I have a bunch of files that are encrypted. Someone gains access to those files, and finds out that he already has one of them, unencrypted. My question ...
82 views

Integrity compromised - HASH modified

As we are all aware that HASHing is user to verify integrity in cryptography. I have a query about hashing. Suppose a man in the middle attacker manipulates the data and creates new HASH (by running ...
235 views

Required key size for an ideal cipher with a 32 bit block size

For an ideal block cipher, what size key would be required when the cipher has a 32-bit block size?
419 views

Cryptography system by combining a block cipher and a stream cipher

I have to come up with a design for a cryptography system by combining a block cipher and a stream cipher. I can't seem to come up with anything on my own. Can someone point me in the right direction ...
313 views

ECDSA for encryption

ECDSA keys are much shorter than RSA keys, but typically only used for signing, not encryption. Is there an accepted way of doing this? (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=196378.0 ...
309 views

Why are twofish or other algorithms not NIST approved, are they still safe?

NIST has a total of 3 approved block ciphers on their website: AES, TDES and skipjack. I get why those are on there (though personally I find TDES a bit iffy) but from my understanding Twofish and ...
447 views

What prime lengths are used for RSA?

Let's assume we have an RSA 2048 that was produced by two primes multiplication. What is the digit's difference in those 2 factors? For example one prime is 1024 digits and second one 1024 or, one is ...
125 views

Why not just encrypt the message and the hash of the message to achieve cryptographic integrity? [duplicate]

I've always seen MACs as a way to provide integrity and authentication. You would just append it to some message in clear. But this is clearly not the case when you're doing Encrypt Then Mac. When ...
62 views

Check if this cryptosystem is safe

Let $G$ be any group where group operations, as well as finding the inverse of an element, can be performed quickly, but the discrete log problem is difficult. Consider the following cryptosystem: ...
466 views

Generation of a cyclic group of prime order

I am trying to implement a cyclic group generator in Java, but I am running into some issues. In many cryptosystems, the following phrase is expressed during the key generation stage. Let G be ...
94 views

Analyzing security flaws of cipher

I know using homebrew encryption can be very dangerous as it is very likely to have many flaws in its design. The following concept is just for learning purpose in case anybody is getting red flags ...
171 views

Voting system validation

I'm developing an application to run elections. A voting system. I would like to give the ability to the voters to check later if their vote were correct computed/casted. assumptions: each user has ...
57 views

When homomorphic encryption goes wrong?

Consider I have two ciphertext $c_1$ and $c_2$ encrypted using RSA encryption. By definition if I multiply them I'd get $c_1.c_2 \ modN$. My question is what would happen if $c_1.c_2 >N$. Can we ...
91 views

stream cipher computation cost [closed]

With AES-CTR the computation time to encrypt a message of lengh $n$ blocks is $n$ computations of the block cipher. What is the running time to encrypt a message of $n$ bits using a stream cipher, ...
86 views

What does $\to$ mean in the following definition of a block cipher?

In the following picture $\kappa$ is the key length and $n$ is the block size. I understand that $\{0,1\}^\kappa$ means all possible combination of keys and $\{0,1\}^n$ means all possible combination ...
60 views

How to make a document truly read only

How is it possibile to cryptographically make a document truly read only? As in read only I imply that the user can obviously view it which can be achieved by coding which pixels have which colors. ...
114 views

How can I process data within a cloud securely?

I'm new to programming and I'm getting ready to design a proof of concept for an app that I'm thinking of building. Problem is I'm a complete noob to cryptography and need a little nudge to point me ...
286 views

Is C25519/Ed25519 “twist secure”?

This recent new curve mentions something that's new to me: twist security. http://safecurves.cr.yp.to/bada55.html Are the existing C25519/Ed25519 curves secure against this form of attack?
60 views

Ensuring that an operation takes a relatively specific amount of time, but easily verify the result

I want an algorithm of some sort that can ensure that an operation takes a fairly specific amount of time, but proof that this operation was done can be completed relatively inexpensively. For ...
228 views

Question on RSA trapdoor permutation

You plan to use a public-key cryptosystem based on the RSA trapdoor permutation in three different real-life applications, in which the attacker has, respectively, only one of the following resources: ...
75 views

If $G'(s)=G(s0^{|s|})$ and $G$ is a PRNG, is $G'$ necessarily a PRNG? [closed]

I argue it is because there should be no more correlation between the outputs $G(s0^{|s|})$ than between the outputs $G(s)$. Thus we can say the $G'(s)$ is a PRNG that satisfies $|G'(s)| \geq 4|s|$. ...
907 views

My SSH server public key is 2048 bits, but my account's private key is 4096. What is my effective security?

My SSH server has a 2048-bit public key. But my private key, for clients to login, is 4096-bit. In this case, do I have the brute force protection of 2048 or 4096 bits? My worry is that someone ...
166 views

Why does DSS have such formulas?

I've learnt the formulas needed for the DSA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Signature_Algorithm). But most importantly, I don't quite understand what represents those formulas and why they are ...
791 views

Why use CBC-MAC? Why not just apply hash function on the whole message?

Why not just apply hash function on the whole message? Why convert that message into blocks and hash those blocks? To avoid collisions?
132 views

No Birthday Attack to TCR

I'm reading the paper “Collision-Resistant Hashing? Towards Making UOWHFs Practical” , which compared TCR (Target Collision Resistant) and ACR (Any collision Resistant). It says we wish to stress ...
131 views

Consider a secure modern block cipher like AES/Serpent/Twofish. I hear everyone say that the complexity is $2^{128}$ for a 128 block cipher. But isn't the weak link the actual hashed and salted ...
219 views

What are the weaknesses of this message exchange protocol?

Here is a protocol for a key exchange: Bob encrypts a message $m$ with his key $K_B$: $m_1 = E_{K_B}(m)$. Bob send the result $m_1$ to you. Alice encrypts my encrypted above message with her own ...
287 views

Proving HMAC collision probability bounds?

Could someone point to results or proofs about the probability of $$HMAC(k, m_1) = HMAC (k, m_2)$$ assuming the underlying hash function is SHA-256? Would those probabilities be higher/lower if $m_1$ ...