# All Questions

63 views

### Hashing/encrypting an integer to produce an unique integer in the same range

I'm looking for a function or set of functions that can produce a pseudo-random permutation on an input set of arbitrary size. Given a set of $M$ values in range $0..M-1$, where $M$ is positive ...
66 views

### How does the length of the plaintext affect the cipher strength?

Let the block length 64-bit, 256-bit key, cipher text accordingly - 64 bits. What is the strength of the block cipher, if any unknown attacks, which could reduce its strength. We can only brute force. ...
208 views

### When using Curve25519, why does the private key always have a fixed bit at 2^254?

When using Curve25519, the private key always seems to have a fixed bit set at position 2^254. Why is that? Is there any good reason to use a fixed positioned most-significant-bit in the private key? ...
52 views

### Authentication of machine before installation (to stop piracy) [closed]

I have a web-software project which needs a bit of protection in form of authencitation… This web based software runs on an intranet. There is no access to the internet from these terminal machines. ...
42 views

### Private Information Retrieval with a pre-prepared database

Informally, Private Information Retrieval (PIR) is a protocol between a user $U$ and a Server $S$, that meets the following conditions: $U$ obtains enough information about a database hosted by $S$, ...
51 views

### Applying differential cryptanalysis to ciphers with addition mod $2^{32}$

I am studying differential analysis and have a question. Consider the following simple cipher: $$c_1 = S(m_1 \oplus k_1) \oplus k_2$$ (Plaintext $m_1$ xor with key $K_1$, then result goes into an ...
66 views

### OpenPGP Brainwallet

This question is an intersection of two pieces of technology. The first is on Hierarchical Deterministic Wallets from the Bitcoin Space. The second is on OpenPGP key generation. Has anyone created a ...
26 views

### hill cipher encryption way 1x3 plaintext matrix

Can someone help me with a Hill cipher? When do I have to use: 1x3 plain text matrix (p1, p2, p3) * 3x3 key matrix 3x3 key matrix * 3x1 plain text matrix Or they are both correct? I tried to ...
28 views

### how to truncate a PRF on n bits to PRF on t bits where t < n?

Dan Boneh's courersa lecture on format preserving encryption at 5.50 mins , talks about truncating a PRF on n bits to PRF on t bits. The approach is by appending (n-t) zeros to input t bits then ...
131 views

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

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

### Is it possible to decrypt an RSA ciphertext with only $N$ and $e$?

Is it possible to perform RSA decryption if one only knows $N$ and $e$? Failing that, what is the maximum key length where brute-force is still practically feasible?
75 views

### ElGamal signature: Forging a signature of a specific form

I have a question I can't solve from one of the courses I'm currently taking: Show that given a legitimate ElGamal signature $(S,R)$ on a given message $m$, an attacker can compute a signature ...
31 views

### Replacing 8 sBoxes in DES with just 1 sBox, expected result?

Ok, i am trying to modify DES by my own way. There will be just one sBox and it will also contain all values from other 7 sBoxes. How it affects DES in this case? [? more secure/less ...
56 views

### Merkle Tree High Tree

I'm reading Merkle tree signatures and I like know if the security of the that scheme depends, also, of the high of the tree or only depends that hash function is resistant to collision?
99 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 ...
118 views

### Why can we always assume that $Gen$ algorithm choose key uniformly?

Talking about a (symmetric) encryption scheme $\Pi=(Gen,Enc,Dec)$ where $Gen$ take the security parameter $n$ as input and generates a key $k$ of length $n$. Generally speaking we say that $Gen$ ...
123 views

### Why not just generate random strings for one-time password (OTP)?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-time_password#How_OTPs_are_generated_and_distributed Why have so many methods to generate OTPs, why not just use just random strings?
101 views

### Secure function evaluation

Consider 3 parties, Alice, Bob and Charlie. Suppose each party has a bit as input, i.e. Alice, Bob and Charlie hold $a, b, c \in \{0, 1\}$ respectively. Show how construct a scheme with which ...
57 views

### hybrid PKE scheme CCA2 insecurity

I'm reading a paper here say: As we know, in hybrid PKE schemes XOR alone cannot perfectly hide challenge bit to the CCA2 adversary The author does not define hybrid PKE schemes. What is ...
98 views

### Why does the crypto_box functionality in NaCl library exposes the nonce to the programmer

The idea of crypto_box API in NaCl library is to shield the programmer away from the technical details and provide an easy to use functions for encrypting and encrypting messages. Given what I've ...
207 views

### Has threefish successfully been attacked (practically or theoretically)?

Reading Schneier's "The Doghouse: Crypteto" dated September 30, 2009, I noticed Bruce Schneier stating: Threefish, the block cipher inside Skein, encrypts data at 7.6 clock cycles/byte with a ...
59 views

### Is the following aggregation scheme private?

Is the following scheme private? By private i mean an untrusted aggregator (UA) cannot reveal anything other then an aggregate function output on plaintext data Each party holds a secret key $k_i$ ...
108 views

### PPT eavesdroper able to output $m_{0}$ and $m_{1}$ of different lengths

I've read the following two questions and their answers: Messages of different lengths and one-time computationally-secret Why is a non fixed-length encryption scheme worse than a fixed-length one? ...
46 views

### Difference between computational and statistical indistinguishabilities

What is the difference between these two notions?
76 views

### Bellovin 96' attack on IPsec ESP protocol on encryption only option

Can you explain the actual attack? Why does the attacker need to firstly send some arbitrary UDP packet? How can the attacker break the privacy between A and B? Link: The article of Bellovin I'm ...
43 views

### Why send a challenge with CHAP?

I have been reading about the Challenge-Handshake authentication Protocol (aka CHAP). Why send a challenge to the user and ask them to hash that challenge with the symmetric key and send that hash ...
71 views

### Can we build authenticated encryption using Feistel Networks?

Most of the encryption modes of Feistel Networks especially the ones used to build fixed length block ciphers just provide confidentiality . Can we build authenticated encryption using Feistel ...
161 views

### What criteria make the theta step of Keccak's round function reversible?

From what I've been reading, Keccak's round function is reversible. That's pretty obvious for the $\rho$, $\pi$ and $\iota$ transforms. For $\chi$ to be reversible, $x$'s range has to be odd — but ...
2k views

### How does a padding oracle attack work?

I am unsure of how a padding oracle attack works. What I am not getting is how changing one bit at one time allows one to exploit(get keys) ASP.NET machines. Can anyone explain this?
128 views

### Any historical accounts of cryptanalysis of Jefferson's wheel cipher?

David Kahn in his book "The Codebreakers" wrote about Jefferson's wheel cipher, saying that To this day the Navy uses it… (the book was first published in 1967) Are there any historical accounts ...
2k views

### Avalanche effect in DES

I couldn't understand the avalanche effect in DES. Could someone explain how avalanche effect happens in DES
84 views

### use the same pad reversed

Suppose I have a random number (eg 625 467 921). I use it once to encrypt a message OTP style, and when I want to use them again, I reverse them (eg to ...
60 views

### Efficient parameters for group Diffie-Hellman

I want to implement a basic version of Diffie-Hellman key agreement for groups. So, my key is $K=g^{abc} \mod p$. Following this, the parameters I would need to transfer would be $K_a = g^{bc}$ etc. ...
72 views

### Biometric authentication [closed]

I see in some “Authentication schemes with biometric” papers that those authors wrote a phase as password and biometric update phase. My question is that why we may needs biometric update phase? Is ...
229 views

### What happens when a root CA has its private key compromised?

What happens when a root CA has its private key compromised? Then all children in the tree are compromised too? And then all certificates are compromised? What needs to happen then? Related: - How ...
38 views

### What is the difference between a one-shot MPC protocol and a unbounded invocation of multiple MPC protocols?

In this paper on pg. 1236 under the section "Security Against Continual Leakage" the authors say: We further remark that the weaker security notion previously achieved cannot be extended ...
256 views

### Can you break a multi language code using Frequency analysis?

Let say that I wrote a 26 letter alphabet, each letter of my alphabet represent a letter from the latin alphabet. I'm writing in 3 languages, only I know which languages. Grammar is the one from my ...
172 views

### Homomorphic (encrypted) comparison to an integer

When working with an additive homomorphic encryption scheme (say Pallier's), is there an efficient way to get the encrypted value of a comparison test to an integer value (I realise that an ...
243 views

### With a true random number generator at hand, how to implement one-time pad?

I have a Raspberry Pi single-board computer that happened to have an hardware true random number generator, based on some quantum effects on the processor silicon, baked into its BCM2835 chip and I ...
171 views

### How practical is proxy re-encryption for AES?

In proxy re-encryption schemes, a proxy is given special information that allows it to translate a ciphertext under one key into a ciphertext of the same message under a different key. How ...
738 views

### Is a known plaintext, ciphertext, and public-key a viable attack on RSA?

Assume Alice and Bob are using RSA to create a common session key and Cindy is listening, attempting to obtain the session key. Alice and Bob each have their public- and private-key pairs ...
262 views

### Why xor the message into the state for sponge hashes?

Sponge hashes like Keccak(SHA-3) and CubeHash, xor a message block into part of the internal state. Why use a reversible operation like xor for that, instead of replacing that part of the state with ...
475 views

### Predicting PRNG given some of its previous output

I a have a question about PRNGs and this is my very first experience with them. I have the following generator that takes a 56-bit seed $p$ during initialization and then chooses both $X$ and $Y$ ...
137 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)
114 views

### I've got my private key compromised. How does CRL work?

How does certificate revocation list (CRL) work? How can I send a request to the CA to add my current private key to the CRL, so no one except me can add my certificate to the CRL? Related: - How can ...
59 views

### Why do the outputs of parties in an MPC protocol have to be indistinguishable from the ideal / real world (as opposed to inputs)?

In this paper at the bottom of pg. 1235 and beginning of pg. 1236 it says: An MPC protocol is said to be secure, if for every real world leakage adversary A there exists an ideal world ...
9k views

### Google is using RC4, but isn't RC4 considered unsafe?

Why is Google using RC4 for their HTTPS/SSL? \$ openssl s_client -connect www.google.com:443 | grep "Cipher is" New, TLSv1/SSLv3, Cipher is RC4-SHA Isn't RC4 ...
125 views

### PAK Diffie-Hellman vs. sharing high-entropy key

In order to setup an authenticated shared secret key between two clients, I am faced with the choice between two possibilities: A: Let users set a (low-entropy) shared password and then perform some ...