# All Questions

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### Is there a public-key cryptography method that enables public keys to be much smaller than private keys?

Does a public key cryptography method that enables the public key to be orders of magnitude smaller than the private key exist?
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### Generating unsigned, bounded random value using signed bounded random values

Use case: I have a random number generator that can generate random numbers in a range that is limited by a number $x$, say $x$ ranges from $2$ to $2^{(n - 1)} - 1$ exclusive. In this case $n$ is $16$,...
179 views

### Is there a reason that the N value in scrypt is limited to powers of two?

I have been looking at the scrypt hashing algorithm and am confused as to why the N value, which determines the overall cost, is limited to powers of two. There are ...
175 views

### Homomorphic Encryption - Smart Vercauteren Batching

I'm going through Smart and Vercauteren's paper "Fully Homomorphic SIMD operations" and had a question about some notation used in the paper. In section 2 of the above it is stated that for each ...
271 views

### McEliece information set decoding attack vulnerability

Wikipedia states that McEliece is open to "information set decoding attack". What is an "information set decoding attack" and how serious is the vulnerability? (is it just a matter of choosing proper ...
225 views

### Choice of reduction polynomial in Whirlpool's internal cipher

Whirlpool is an interesting little hash function in the Miyaguchi-Preneel family. In my mind, it's most interesting feature is the design of internal cipher W, where the distinction between key and ...
3k views

### ASCII to same-length ASCII encryption?

I need to encrypt an ASCII string [a-zA-Z0-9:] to an ASCII [a-zA-Z0-9] string of the same length. It doesn't have to be unbreakable, it's sufficient that it won't be readable at the first sight. The ...
1k views

### Java's SecureRandom & plaintext attack?

Java's SecureRandom is meant to be cryptographically secure, and I know part of that means that the output should not be usable to predict further output. Though, ...
607 views

### Why use Needham-Schroeder if we have Diffie-Hellman?

If we want to establish secret symmetric key between two entities, why use Needham-Schroeder if we have Diffie-Hellman? With DH we don't need to have any trusted party, so what's the point of NS?
682 views

### Why use a timestamp and how can someone know it's the correct one?

Let's say A wants to send a message, so everyone who gets the message, can be assured that it's from A. A then sends a message ...
779 views

### Is CBC mode encryption vulnerable to a reordering attack?

I know that, if CBC-MAC is used in such a way that the tag is the concatenation of all the blocks' outputs (and not just the last one), it's insecure under CPA for the simplest case of 2 blocks CBC-...
260 views

### Why does CBC-MAC need prefix-free inputs to be a good PRF?

In the FFX spec, there is a note about using CMAC as the round function. Security notes. The round function F is constructed in such a way that the set of inputs on which the CBC-MAC is ...
303 views

### How to Distribute the Shares using Secret Sharing for arbitrary Monotone Access Structures

Consider 4 people, $A$,$B$,$C$,$D$, & a secret $s\in\{0,1\}^k$. Construct a scheme which enables the following subsets of people to retrieve the secret $\{A,B\}$, $\{A,C\}$, $\{B,C,D\}$. I know ...
416 views

### Decrypting without using the private key

Let $g$ be a generator of a multiplicative group $G$ of order $q$, $x$ be a private key, and $h=g^x$ be a public key of an exponential ElGamal cryptosystem. Given a ciphertext $c$ produced as the ...
2k views

### Difference between salted hash and keyed hashing?

A cryptographic salt is additional input other than message itself for a hash function so that it prevents attacker from launching dictionary attacks . Usually the salt is stored along with the hash ...
651 views

### some of my confusions about DDH assumption

The wiki defines the decisional Diffie–Hellman assumption as follows: Decisional Diffie–Hellman assumption Consider a (multiplicative) cyclic group $G$ of order $q$, and with generator $g$. The DDH ...
1k views

### Possible ECC backdoor and its impact on Internet traffic

In a recent article, Bruce Schneier suggested that he prefers classic discrete log crypto over ECC because "I no longer trust the constants. I believe the NSA has manipulated them through their ...
295 views

### Can padding length, and thus plaintext length, be considered public information when using aes-cbc?

Right now I'm using a simple padding system that takes the plaintext, hashes it with SHA512, and appends $x$ bytes of the hash as padding where $x$ is the delta between the plaintext and nearest ...
244 views

### Swapping Key and IV in AES? Safe?

I have an application where I want to be able to send an encrypted file, and then mete out "keys" that allow the receipient to decrypt the file from a certain point to the end of the file. Actually, ...
228 views

### Securely generating passwords based on a secret and a public identifier

I'm trying to create a good scheme for generating passwords in my systems management scripts. What I'd like to do is have a secret key (let's say hello123), which I ...
98 views

### Is it possible to insert a key derivation function when using EAX?

I am currently investigating use of EAX mode for a dedicated application and following useful clarifications received from my previous post , to consider according to my applicable input security ...
478 views

### How does partial key escrow work?

It is being speculated that one of the ways that NSA leaker Edward Snowden may have created his "insurance policy" – distributing sensitive documents to various individuals with instructions to ...
192 views

### Does EAX use the same keys for encryption and authentication?

I am actually checking use of EAX AEAD mode, and following EAX spec review (scheme definition for my part), my question is: what about the derivation of the authentication and encryption keys? In the ...
284 views

I'm playing around with an application for secure email-like communication and I want to perform length hiding padding on the plaintext messages so they always have a consistent size before encrypting ...
84 views

### “proof of access” schemes

What is the state of the art way when implementing a scheme challenging a party to prove they have access to certain data? What I'm looking for something along the lines of Give them (id-some-data,...
615 views

### Alternatives to HMAC + CBC?

I'm looking at using HMAC + CBC. The combination looks like this: ciphertext = AES256(text, k1) data = HMAC-SHA256(iv | ciphertext, k2) | iv | ciphertext Where: ...
824 views

### Recommended way of adding a pepper/secret key to password before hashing?

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 ...
2k views

### Would a “Triple AES” (in the sense of how Triple Des works) serve for a dramatic increase in safety?

The system requires to be as paranoid as possible regarding security. One of the few contemplated changes to the current design is to use multiple encryption. First proposal was to use Serpent on top ...
655 views

### Is there a way to use Shamir Secret Sharing with updatable data?

I want to divide a system that maintains these properties, based on Shamir's Secret Sharing: A secret key is split up to N pieces, where T of them are enough to reconstruct the key. The original key ...
3k views

### What data is saved in RSA private key?

What data is saved in RSA private key in openssl? How to view it? Wikpedia says these variables are saved.
1k views

### Visualization of cryptography

I think CrypTool is great software. And what I find most useful in it is visualization of algorithms such as Caesar, Vigenere, AES, DES. And my question is: does anyone know other tools which are ...
239 views

### Future-Proof Versioning and Validation

I am working on a library (using standard primitives: AES256 CTR; HMAC with SHA256; PBKDF2 with SHA256, 128 bit salt, and 10000 rounds) to encrypt and decrypt data, given a password. The encrypted ...
1k views

### How to generate a public key from a private ECDSA key?

Having some specific ECDSA curve and a private key, how does one calculate the public key? I am having a hard time finding the algorithm and equations for it.
2k views

### Cracking the Beaufort cipher

Is there any easy way to crack a Beaufort cipher? We have a Vigenère table, and are trying to guess the keyword. Any easier way?
4k views

### Why, or when, to use an Initialization Vector?

i'm trying to figure out when an Intialization Vector (IV) should be used. There are anecdotal reports that WEP was broken because of weak IV's. It's also claimed that if two pieces of plaintext are ...
204 views

### What authentication techniques can be used by QKD Systems?

As it is well known that QKD systems are prone to simple MITM attacks… what authentication techniques are being used in QKD to prevent those attacks in practice?
Suppose I have an encryption scheme of the form $E(P)=C$ where $P$ is the plaintext and belongs in $\{0,1\}^N$, $C$ the ciphertext which belongs to $\{0,1\}^M$ and the encryption is performed under ...