# All Questions

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### Security of simple Skein PBKDF mentioned in the paper

From the Skein 1.3 paper section 4.8, Skein as a Password-Based Key Derivation Function (PBKDF), it mentions the following as a simple PBKDF (S = seed and P = password): An even simpler PBKDF is ...
102 views

### Is this an example of a zero knowlege proof?

My Math Structures professor mentioned the strange concept of a zero knowledge proof to me after class one day, and I decided to do some reading about it. After reading the relatively famous "How to ...
129 views

### Is it safe to prefix the a key with a known value?

Almost every encryption algorithm is based on a secret key. I wonder when the algorithm is considered safe, does that also imply that I can prefix (or suffix) the key with a known value, as long as ...
98 views

### Creating a new cipher! [closed]

http://flashbackcipher.blogspot.ae/2015/03/introducing-flashback.html Hey guys the above is the blog for a new cipher, if you guys can take a look and suggest problems.. it would be of great help!! :...
1k views

### RC4 , Is it possible to find the key if we know the plaintext and ciphertext?

Is it possible to find the key if we know the plaintext and ciphertext with RC4. How should I write the algorithm?
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### How dangerous is it to encrypt with AES 256 if the end user knows the unencrypted value?

I am implementing a bit of security in a system that was originally built without encryption on a specific piece of data. The plan was to encrypt this piece of data and include it as part of the ...
3k views

### Encrypting small values with RSA private key

I'm looking for best practices when it comes to encrypting small (< 128 bytes) amounts of data with the RSA private key. Signing it would make the resulting payload too large.
369 views

### What is the most light-weight symmetric cipher thats still usefull?

I need a very light encryption scheme which costs almost no performance during encryption (while decryption may be slow). I found 5 algorithms: RC4, DES, LED, PRESENT, and Piccolo. But how do I ...
278 views

### MAC in SSH packet encryption, benefits to not including it?

What are the benefits to not including MAC in a SSH packet encryption? I understand what the MAC is there for, but if it was not included would there be an advantage? Is the MAC somewhat redundant ...
84 views

### Do asymmetric signatures require constant-time verification?

To avoid a timing attack, HMAC signatures are usually compared in constant-time (every byte is compared, and the results aggregated). Is the same necessary for asymmetric signature algorithms such ...
240 views

### What happens when a RC4 stream gets corrupted?

I want to encrypt a large file using RC4. But what happens if the encrypted file gets corrupted (bytes modified or lost)? Can I still decrypt the rest of the file correctly? If not, what is the best ...
42 views

### Determining nonce between unsynced systems

It's my first venture into cryptography, and I'm struggling with how to use a nonce in an encryption standard between two digital radios. The two radios support AES encryption, only requiring a 128-...
144 views

### Deciphering text encrypted with a changing cipher

I know there are many ways to crack basic ciphers were each letter is mapped to some other letter, but what ways are there to decode something that was encrypted using a cipher that changed after ...
130 views

### HMAC tag to verify the key (verification in the reverse direction)

A quick question. Are there any problems with the following HMAC use-case: We have two entities ($A$ and $B$), both of them have a secret ($A$ has $S_0$ and $B$ has $S_1$) $A$ generates a random ...
499 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 ...
661 views

### Deterministically generate a RSA public/private key pair from a passphrase (with sufficient entropy)?

Is it possible to deterministically generate public/private RSA key pairs from passphrases? Would giving the (key generating) algorithm data made from key-stretching the passphrase (instead of a ...
532 views

### Secret sharing scheme with possibility to change the secret

Here's a scenario I want to handle with a secret sharing scheme: Alice wants to share the secret $S$ with Bob, Charlie and Dave. Alice generates private shares based on $S$ for Bob, Charlie and Dave,...
309 views

### Can we reverse a hash when we know part of the input?

While I read that hashes are not meant to be reversible, but assuming we have part/half of the message/input of a hash? Is there any method that we can use to recover the remaining message via this ...
2k views

### Why are RSA key sizes almost always a power of two?

I know that other bit sizes are possible, e.g. this HTTPS server seems to have a 9000 bit key https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/analyze.html?d=qqq.gg, but it's very rare that one sees a key not of size ...
292 views

### Concatenation of two strong hashes may have striking weakness

For any hash functions $H_0$ and $H_1$, it is easily proved that their concatenation $H_0\|H_1$, defined by $(H_0\|H_1)(X)=H_0(X)\|H_1(X)$, is at least as resistant as the strongest of $H_0$ and $H_1$ ...
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275 views

### Steganography Decryption From Completely Black Image

I am trying to decrypt a completely black gif that I know has been encrypted by some sort of steganography. I've tried subtracting the bytes of the images with each other, and so far I have gotten a ...
118 views

### why do files downloaded with http and https have the same size?

while working with Encryption mostly cipher text is always larger the plain text, why isn't that the case when downloading a file using https ? even that compression isn't much used anymore because if ...
68 views

### Requested to encrypt data with AES256, digital certification, timestamped

at my job we have been tasked by gov to encrypt some data we send to them. The "law" says we have to do the title above, but they only need us to do the AES256 thing because the data is not really ...
1k views

### decrypt a saml 2.0 response having aes 128 and rsa [closed]

I need to decrypt a saml 2.0 response. But, the response object has reference to aes 128 and rsa algorithms, and I am having hard time in finding a way to decrypt. Below is the structure of the ...
81 views

### RSA Decryption from samples

I am working on a project for a client which involves decryption of data which was encrypted using RSA. The system in question retains three independent copies of each data-set, but each copy is ...
220 views

### Why does consecutive permutations or consecutive substitutions not enhance security?

My professor stated that permutations which are done repeatedly does not further enhance security than just one permutation. He also stated that fact this applies to consecutive substitutions as well. ...
711 views

### RSA key pair generation and FIPS 140-2, 186-4

I need to securely generate RSA key pair and I need to have access to private exponent in order to process it further. What's the difference in FIPS 140-2 and FIPS 186-4 in connection with RSA key ...
64 views

### Statistical saturation attack on block ciphers [duplicate]

I was wondering if anyone around here could give me some explanation on this type of attacks. Pretty much the only thing that I could find is this What I really need is basic explanation of the ...
81 views

### What is the benefit of applying the tweak a second time using XTS?

I tried to understand the inner working of XTS. What I understood is that it is applying the tweak two times: once on the plaintext and once on the output. What is the benefit of applying the tweak ...
248 views

### Java RSA Padding: no libraries used

I'm trying to implement RSA without using any java libraries using the algorithm from wikipedia HERE So, anyone can clearly see that it is a raw RSA, and can directly be attacked. The question is ...
148 views

### What does variable-base point/scalar multiplication mean in ECC?

I am a bit confuse about the term, variable-base point/scalar multiplication, in Elliptic Curve Cryptography. What I have understood so far. It means that the base or point on EC is variable/unknown. ...
55 views

### Encryption with a known plaintext

I'm building an application where users can be a part of groups, and can obtain and distribute URLs from the group page that allow anyone who clicks on them to join said group. Groups should not ...
546 views

### How do you break encryption on a message? [closed]

This may seem like a simple question, but I have just started studying cryptography and I can't seem to find any information on this at all. I am trying to write a "simple" encrypted messenger using ...
799 views

### AES encryption takes more time to decrypt than encrypt

I am trying to find how much time an AES encryption and decryption takes for a given amount of data and key. In all the cases encryption takes way lesser processing time than decryption. I tried to ...
7k views

### Avalanche effect in DES

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