All Questions

257 views

Does this block cipher mode allow for decryption?

Is there's a way for someone (with the key) to decrypt a message encrypted with the cipher mode shown? $$P_0 = IV$$ $$C_i = P_{i-1} \oplus E_K(P_i) \oplus P_i$$
442 views

How close is homomorphic encryption to handling regular expressions?

Is there any reasonable homomorphic encryption protocol that supports some meaningful fragment of regular languages/expressions and/or edit distance bounds? I'm suspicious that homomorphic encryption ...
134 views

How is the password sent across for verification?

I am familiar with Challenge-Response Authentication scheme. However I would like to know actual message content sent between client and server for 1 way authentication, over an insecure channel. ...
6k views

Why is AES resistant to known-plaintext attacks?

At least it's my understanding that AES isn't affected by known-plaintext. Is it immune to such an attack, or just resistant? Does this vary for chosen-plaintext?
277 views

Verifying the integrity of ciphertext using the cleartext hash?

I want to be able to verify the integrity of a ciphertext by providing the cleartext hash, for this to work it would need to: $$hash(crypt(cleartext)) = f(hash(cleartext))$$ Where $f$ is an ...
445 views

Can I determine if a user has the wrong symmetric encryption key?

We're using the Objectivity/DB object database with a custom encryption plugin that encrypts serialized objects on disk. Encryption uses AES with a shared secret key held by all users. I would like to ...
213 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 ...
254 views

Is EKE attackable by a brute-force password search?

So I'm trying to properly implement the EKE protocol and I'm using C# with the Windows CNG and ECDH key exchange. I need to use this because it's FIPS certified and all that jazz. So what I'm ...
1k views

What is the relation between Discrete Log, Computational Diffie-Hellman and Decisional Diffie-Hellman?

How are the three problems Discrete Logarithm, Computational Diffie-Hellman and Decisional Diffie-Hellman related? From my understanding, since the Discrete Log (DL) Problem is considered hard, then ...
456 views

Creating a hash of XOR'd blocks

Suppose a message $m$ is divided into blocks of length $160$ bits: $m > = M_1 || M_2 || ... || M_l$ And define $h(m) = M_1 \oplus M_2 \oplus ... \oplus M_l$ Which of the three desirable ...
258 views

How safe is it to derive MAC key from a hashed password?

Imagine I have a blob that I want to encrypt-then-MAC. Now, what I can realistically ask my users for (out of UX considerations) is just an encryption password. Naturally, I bcrypt original password ...
5k views

How to choose a padding mode with AES

Depending on the framework you are using, there are various padding modes that can be used with AES encryption. For example, with .NET we can choose PKCS7, ISO10126, ANSIX923, Zeros or None. I ...
863 views

How do you find a cheater in Shamir Secret Sharing?

If there are 4 people involved, and every two of them should be able to know the secret (the polynomial is just a line) and you are given f(x) and x for each of those people, and you know one of them ...
988 views

Cryptanalysis Affine Cipher: Brute-Force Search Vs. Meet-in-the-middle

Affine Cipher: $Enc(x) = (ax + b) \mod m$ $Dec(x) = a^{-1}(x-b) \mod m$ For a brute-force key search, we need to do $a \cdot b$ encryptions in the worst case. For a meet-in-the-middle attack, how ...
2k views

ElGamal Signature Scheme: Recovering the key when reusing randomness

Show how if Alice uses the same value of $k$ to sign two different messages $m_1$ and $m_2$, using the ElGamal signature scheme, Eve can recover the value of $a$ from the corresponding signatures ...
545 views

Malleability of ElGamal and Hashed ElGamal

Question: Suppose A encrypts a number $x$ which indicates her bid on a contract, using ElGamal encryption. Say that the encryption of $x$ produces a ciphertext $c$. Explain how E can modify $c$ to ...
1k views

RSA: If n=35, show that e will equal d

Show that if $n = 35$ is used as an RSA modulus then the encryption exponent $e$ always equals the decryption exponent $d$? What I have so far: $n = 35$ Therefore $p = 5$ and $q = 7$ or vice versa, ...
810 views

Why is ElGamal considered non-deterministic?

One difference between RSA and ElGamal is that ElGamal isn't necessarily deterministic (while RSA is). What makes it non-deterministic? Is this advantageous to security? How else does this property ...
758 views

How does GPG verify succesful decryption?

How does GPG (or other programs using the OpenPGP file format) verify that it has succeeded with decryption (for symmetrically encrypted data)? Is something appended to the clear text so there exist ...
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 ...
939 views

What does SSL use? RSA? El-Gamal? Elliptic curves?

I'm not sure what SSL uses to share the symmetric key to both end users, i.e. at the beginning of the communication. Is it RSA? Or El-Gamal? Or something else?
287 views

How are trapdoor functions developed/found and where can I find existing ones?

Trapdoor functions are a fundamental part of public key cryptography. An example of the most common trapdoor is Prime Factorization, used in cryptosystems such as RSA How are these trapdoor ...
877 views

Proof of security for RSA signatures

I am new to here, I was having some problems with a problem I am working on: "For each of the following variants of the definition of security for signatures, state whether textbook RSA is secure ...
1k views

ElGamal: Multiplicative cyclic group and key generation

Here on the ElGamal wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ElGamal_encryption Alice generates an efficient description of a multiplicative cyclic group G, of order q, with generator g. How ...
4k views

Definition of Textbook RSA

What is the definition of Textbook RSA? What are some of the properties of textbook RSA? How does it differ from other RSAs?
200 views

How to control the output of a hash function to output to specific data according to similarity?

I do not know if the question lies exactly in that field but i'll give it a try unless rejection. I want to study methods of applying LSH functions to feet in a specific area of digest values. Briefly ...
1k views

What is the importance of Modular arithmetic in cryptography?

Why do we use modular arithmetic so often in Cryptography?
937 views

RSA-based authentication and key-agreement protocol

An authentication and key-agreement protocol between devices shall mutually demonstrate their identity, and establish a shared random secret $R$ suitable for securing later communications. To that ...
9k views

Are there two known strings which have the same MD5 hash value?

Is there an example of two known strings which have the same MD5 hash value (representing a so-called "MD5 collision")?
675 views

How do I solve this RSA instance for m?

How we can solve this equation and get the value of M? $$8 = M^{13} \mod 33$$ not a computer program, but a mathematical operation.
281 views

What other one-way functions are used in cryptosystems?

For RSA and El Gamal (and most other public key cryptosystems), one of the key ideas is that factoring and finding discrete logarithms are hard. There are other systems that rely on certain properties ...
893 views

Demonstrating the insecurity of an RSA signature encoding scheme

I'm working on problem 12.4 from Katz-Lindell. The problem is as follows: Given a public encoding function $\newcommand{\enc}{\operatorname{enc}}\enc$ and a textbook RSA signature scheme where ...
290 views

Is it safe to store initial counter value for AES-CTR alongside with ciphertext?

The initial counter value can actually be thought of as a sort of IV, which I assume is safe to transmit with the ciphertext, but I really want to be sure that this is indeed safe.
281 views

Why are the random exponents so much bigger in the Socialist Millionaire protocol versus Diffie-Hellman key exchange?

Section 8, Security considerations, of RFC3526, which defines groups used for Diffie-Hellman has a table recommending some random exponent sizes. In particular, it says: The strength of a key ...
175 views

Does hash_df use binary or an ASCII hexadecimal representation for numbers to be passed to the hash function?

I'm implementing the HASH_DRBG algorithm. As per NIST-SP800 90 document for HASH DRBG Generation, section 10.4.1 "Derivation Function Using a Hash Function (Hash_df)", the Hash_df algorithm contains ...
1k views

Why does the padding in MD5 contain the message length?

I understand the need for padding in MD5. But why do we append the message length to the padding? I heard it strengthens the hash but how? Please provide an example if possible and how it applies to ...
4k views

Cracking plain RSA without private key

I was wondering whether plain RSA encryption can be cracked given: The public key A plaintext of a known cipher text(s). In other words the decrypted message from an encrypted one (but without ...
765 views

Random oracle model proofs and programmability

Proving the security of a scheme with the random oracle model (ROM) involves two steps: first you prove that the scheme is secure in an idealized world where a random oracle exists, and then you ...
527 views

Are there two-way encryption algorithms that include a work factor?

I recently learned about the hashing algorithm bcrypt, which allows you to specify a "work factor" for the hash which can be incremented to stay ahead of Moore's Law. I understand there are some other ...
821 views

How many possible input files are there who's length can be stored in 63-bits?

I'm trying to calculate how many possible combinations of files there can be using a signed 64-bit file length, but can't seem to find a formula (or I'm using the wrong keywords). For example, the ...
547 views

Generalizing the conversion of Diffie-Hellman to El Gamal

How can we generalize the conversion of Diffie-Hellman to El Gamal public-key encryption scheme? The goals is to be eventually able to show that any 2-round key-exchange protocol can be converted into ...
89 views

How do we find the last two correspondences in an otherwise known even permutation?

A secret even permutation $P$ of the set of non-negative integers less than $n$ is chosen. That might be a Feisltel cipher with a random key. We are given in sequence the $P(x)$ for $x$ from $0$ to ...
2k views

Is HMAC-DRBG or Hash-DRBG stronger?

Out of the two deterministic random bit generators defined in section 10.1 of NIST SP 800-90A (i.e. based on hash functions), which one is cryptographically stronger? Hash-DRBG (Section 10.1.1) ...
143 views

Is a using salt important when creating a hash data validator?

I am creating a service that will return an set of objects, which will be used by multiple systems. At the end of the process, one (or more) of the objects will be sent back to our system for ...
370 views

Are safe primes $p=2^k \pm s$ with $s$ small less recommandable than others as a discrete log modulus?

I take the definition of safe prime as: a prime $p$ is safe when $(p-1)/2$ is prime. Safe primes of appropriate size are the standard choice for the modulus of cryptosystems related to the discrete ...
191 views

What is the property of RSA where N=e?

In RSA, suppose we know that $e=N$ and we are given the value of $e$. ($N = p\cdot q$ for some large primes $p$ and $q$; $\gcd(e, \varphi(N) = 1)$ Can we calculate $d$ (\$d = e^{-1} \mod ...
337 views

What is the appropriate public key encryption for secure coin flipping?

I quote Bobby's question here since I encountered the same one... Random Coin Flip using ElGamal and a Trusted Party Consider the following protocol for two parties to flip a fair coin. Trusted ...
2k views

How to generate a list of unique random strings?

How would you generate a list of distinct random strings, where all strings are alphanumeric and have a fixed length?