Tag Info

There aren't any known attacks on the PRFness of HMAC-SHA256 better than brute force. (So you can truncate that MAC to length L where $\:\:\frac1{2^L}+\epsilon\:\:$ is an acceptable risk of forgery.) To reduce the impact of a forgery without making the ciphertext any longer, one should use a format-preserving encryption (FPE) scheme that is secure against ...

You asked the same question over on the IT Security site. Please don't cross-post. It is frowned upon, under the rules these sites operate. Here is what you should be doing: Truncate the MAC tag to an acceptable length. You will need to choose a length that provides a suitable tradeoff between packet size vs. security against forgery. I suggest you use ...