# All Questions

3answers
2k views

### In the SHA hash algorithm, why is the message always padded?

In the SHA hash algorithm the message is always padded, even if initially the correct length without padding; the padding is of the form "1" followed by the necessary number of 0s. Why is it ...
2answers
113 views

### When to prefer exchanging cryptographic certificates over exchanging only public keys?

Let's think of the following case: A group of peers want to exchange messages with each other. They use public-key cryptography to sign and encrypt messages. Anyone with any name can join the ...
1answer
224 views

### Does omitting the first two lines of RC4's pseudorandom generation algorithm weaken the cipher?

A particular educational software program published by a U.S. government agency uses a variant of RC4 to obfuscate its data files (see Stack Overflow question). The variant of RC4 in question is ...
1answer
68 views

### Cryptographic Algorithm/Protocol needed

I am trying to achieve the following: Encrypted files are stored on users filesystem. The user uses my client to authenticate against a server. Once he is authenticated successfully he gets a token ...
1answer
163 views

### Safely use CryptSignAndEncryptMessage?

I am developing an application that sends messages which I want to encrypt and sign. The CryptoApi offers a function called CryptSignAndEncryptMessage. The description says, what this function ...
1answer
469 views

### Why are MACs in general deterministic, whereas digital signature constructions are randomized?

The fact is I'm not quite sure if my question statement is true, however all the MAC constructions I know of (e.g. CBC-MAC, CMAC, HMAC) are deterministic, whereas many constructions for digital ...
0answers
69 views

### Applying multiple hash functions to improve security? [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Guarding against cryptanalytic breakthroughs: combining multiple hash functions I'm a total newb to cryptography but after reading what I've read about it, I had a ...
1answer
293 views

### OpenPGP Signature Packet hashed data

RFC 4880 describes the version 4 signature packet, tag 2, as ...
1answer
135 views

### RSA/DSA: Wouldn't it make sense to sign using decoding the data hash?

Why is encoding using the private key used for signing? Wouldn't it make sense to keep the premise, that private is for decoding and public is for encoding? i.e. create a hash and threat it as a ...
1answer
262 views

### Which MACs can be converted into a secure unkeyed hash function?

It is known that setting the secret key to a fixed, public value does not make MACs like CBC-MAC or GMAC into secure unkeyed cryptographic hash functions that could be used - for instance - for ...
3answers
228 views

### Algorithm to securely exchange identities

Say four people each have a public/private key pair that they can use to encrypt or sign messages. They have an anonymous way to post messages such that the others can see them. Malicious entities can ...
2answers
259 views

### Brute force a ciphered message? [closed]

I wrote my own cipher to encrypt messages. I would like to test a sample ciphered message to see how strong it is. Are there any tools for such task either in Windows or Linux ?
1answer
304 views

### Is quantum key distribution safe against MITM attacks too?

i read this recently: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12786-quantum-cryptography-to-protect-swiss-election.html and some parts of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_key_distribution ...
1answer
349 views

### Do Cryptographic Hashing Algorithms operate only on Integers?

Do all the Cryptographic hashing algorithms operate only on integers (32 bit or 64 bit)? Is there any operation performed on Floating Point Numbers as well? The reason I ask this is because I read ...
1answer
2k views

### In which order are the round keys used during AES decryption?

In the Add Round Key step in AES decryption, which part of the expanded key will I XOR first to the result of the SubBytes step? Is it the 10th round key? For example, is this the right order? ...
3answers
318 views

### Does the MixColumns step come before or after AddRoundKey in AES decryption?

I found these images depicting the AES decryption process: In the first image, the MixColumns step comes before the AddRoundKey step, while in the second image, the AddRoundKey will come before ...
1answer
379 views

### What is the harm if I publish an encrypted RSA private key publicly?

What is the harm if I publish an encrypted RSA private key publicly? Or in this case, what is the harm if I publish many thousands or millions of them? Assuming that the private key is encrypted ...
2answers
122 views

2answers
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### Algorithm Design for only Mutual Information Sharing

Bob and Alice each have a bit string they want to keep private. They each want to know what the bitwise AND of their two strings would be without telling the other or anyone else listening to their ...
2answers
378 views

### Real life collision when only using truncated hash

For MD5 two different inputs are known that produce the same 128 bit hash value. However, these inputs are artificially created for this specific purpose. For normal, real life inputs I believe no ...
1answer
149 views

### NTRUEncrypt - Choose the initial random polynomial

I'm trying to implement NTRUEncrypt but encounter some problems. I've finished all the basic functions that are needed for the scheme base on this Document, but I can't find an algorithm to check the ...
1answer
116 views

### amateur cryptosystem -> a very long boolean expression -> attempt to reduce it [closed]

(newbie here) I try to analyze amateur cryptosystem and wondering, if it's possible to reduce it as reduce a very long boolean expression? What tool can I try to use?

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