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Public Key Cryptography: - Public-Key Encryption Helps Address Key Distribution Problems - Have Two Aspects of This

Public key cryptography uses two keys: a public key to encrypt data, and a private key to decrypt it. There are several methods for distributing public keys, including public announcement, publicly available directories, or using public key certificates signed by a certificate authority. The Diffie-Hellman key exchange protocol allows two parties to establish a shared secret key over an insecure channel, by each generating and sharing public keys, without either party transmitting the private key.

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100 views

Public Key Cryptography: - Public-Key Encryption Helps Address Key Distribution Problems - Have Two Aspects of This

Public key cryptography uses two keys: a public key to encrypt data, and a private key to decrypt it. There are several methods for distributing public keys, including public announcement, publicly available directories, or using public key certificates signed by a certificate authority. The Diffie-Hellman key exchange protocol allows two parties to establish a shared secret key over an insecure channel, by each generating and sharing public keys, without either party transmitting the private key.

Uploaded by

jagmohan bisht
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Public Key Cryptography

• Public-key encryption helps


address key distribution problems
• Have two aspects of this:
–Distribution of public keys
–Use of public-key encryption to
distribute secret keys
Distribution of Public Keys
• Can be considered as using
one of:
–Public announcement
–Publicly available directory
–Public-key authority
–Public-key certificates
Public Announcement
• Users distribute public keys to recipients
or broadcast to community at large
– e.g. Append PGP keys to email messages or
post to news groups or email list
• Major weakness is forgery
– Anyone can create a key claiming to be
someone else and broadcast it
– Until forgery is discovered can masquerade
as claimed user
Publicly Available Directory
• Can obtain greater security by registering
keys with a public directory
• Directory must be trusted with
properties:
– Contains {name, public-key} entries
– Participants register securely with directory
– Participants can replace key at any time
– Directory is periodically published
– Directory can be accessed electronically
• Still vulnerable to tampering or forgery
Public-Key Authority
• Improve security by tightening control
over distribution of keys from directory
• It has properties of directory
• And requires users to know public key for
the directory
• Then users interact with directory to
obtain any desired public key securely
– Does require real-time access to directory
when keys are needed
Public-Key Authority
Public-Key Certificate
• Certificates allow key exchange without
real-time access to public-key authority
• A certificate binds identity to public key
– Usually with other info such as period of
validity, rights of use etc
• With all contents signed by a trusted
public-key or certificate authority (CA)
• Can be verified by anyone who knows the
public-key authorities public-key
Public-Key Certificates
Public-Key Distribution of Secret Keys
• Use previous methods to obtain public-
key
• Can use for secrecy or authentication
• But public-key algorithms are slow
• So usually want to use private-key
encryption to protect message contents
• Hence need a session key
• Have several alternatives for negotiating
a suitable session
Simple Secret Key Distribution
• Proposed by Merkle in 1979
– A generates a new temporary public key pair
– A sends B the public key and their identity
– B generates a session key K sends it to A
encrypted using the supplied public key
– A decrypts the session key and both use
• Problem is that an opponent can intercept
and impersonate both halves of protocol
Public-Key Distribution of Secret Keys
• if have securely exchanged public-keys:
Hybrid Key Distribution
• Retain use of private-key KDC
• Shares secret master key with each user
• Distributes session key using master key
• Public-key used to distribute master keys
– Especially useful with widely distributed
users
• Rationale
– Performance
– Backward compatibility
Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange
• First public-key type scheme proposed by
Diffie & Hellman in 1976 along with the
exposition of public key concepts
– Note: now know that Williamson secretly
proposed the concept in 1970
• Is a practical method for public exchange
of a secret key
• Used in a number of commercial
products
Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange
• A public-key distribution scheme
– Cannot be used to exchange an arbitrary message
– Rather it can establish a common key
– Known only to the two participants
• Value of key depends on the participants (and
their private and public key information)
• Based on exponentiation in a finite (Galois)
Field (modulo a prime or a polynomial) - easy
• Security relies on the difficulty of computing
discrete logarithms (similar to factoring) –
hard
Diffie-Hellman Setup
• All users agree on global parameters:
– Large prime integer or polynomial ‘q’
– ‘a’ being a primitive root mod ‘q’
• Each user (e.g. A) generates their key
– Chooses a secret key (number): xA < q
– Compute their public key: yA = axA mod q
• Each user makes public that key yA, or YB
Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange
• Shared session key for users A & B is KAB:
KAB = axA.xB mod q
= yAxB mod q (which B can compute)
= yBxA mod q (which A can compute)
• KAB is used as session key in private-key
encryption scheme between Alice and Bob
• If Alice and Bob subsequently communicate,
they will have the same key as before, unless
they choose new public-keys
• Attacker needs an x, must solve discrete log
Diffie-Hellman Example
• Users Alice & Bob who wish to swap keys:
• Agree on prime q=353 and a=3
• Select random secret keys:
– A chooses xA=97, B chooses xB=233
• Compute respective public keys:
– yA=397 mod 353 = 40 (Alice)
– yB=3233 mod 353 = 248 (Bob)
• Compute shared session key as:
– KAB= yBxA mod 353 = 24897 = 160 (Alice)
– KAB= yAxB mod 353 = 40233 = 160 (Bob)
Key Exchange Protocols
• Users could create random private/public
D-H keys each time they communicate
• Users could create a known
private/public D-H key and publish in a
directory, then consulted and used to
securely communicate with them
• Both of these are vulnerable to a meet-
in-the-middle attack
• Authentication of the keys is needed
Summary
• Have considered:
–Distribution of public keys
–Public-key distribution of secret
keys
–Diffie-Hellman key exchange
Powers of integers – Modulo 19
Primitive Roots of 19 are 2, 3, 10, 13, 14, 15

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