Cryptography and Network

Security
Public Key Cryptography and RSA

Every Egyptian received two names, which were known

respectively as the true name and the good name, or
the great name and the little name; and while the
good or little name was made public, the true or great
name appears to have been carefully concealed.
—The Golden Bough, Sir James George Frazer
Private-Key Cryptography

traditional private/secret/single key cryptography uses one key

shared by both sender and receiver
if this key is disclosed communications are compromised
also is symmetric, parties are equal
hence does not protect sender from receiver forging a message &
claiming is sent by sender
Public-Key Cryptography

• probably most significant advance in the 3000 year history of

cryptography
• uses two keys – a public & a private key
• asymmetric since parties are not equal
• uses clever application of number theoretic concepts to function
• complements rather than replaces private key crypto
 Why Public-Key Cryptography?

• developed to address two key issues:

• key distribution – how to have secure communications in general without
having to trust a KDC with your key
• digital signatures – how to verify a message comes intact from the claimed
sender
• public invention due to Whitfield Diffie & Martin Hellman at Stanford
Uni in 1976
• known earlier in classified community
Public-Key Cryptography

• Public-key/two-key/asymmetric cryptography involves

the use of two keys:
• a public-key, which may be known by anybody, and can be used
to encrypt messages, and verify signatures
• a related private-key, known only to the recipient, used to
decrypt messages, and sign (create) signatures
• Infeasible to determine private key from public
• This is asymmetric because
• those who encrypt messages or verify signatures cannot decrypt
messages or create signatures
Public-Key Cryptography
Symmetric vs Public-Key
Public-Key Cryptosystems
 Public-Key Applications
• can classify uses into 3 categories:
• encryption/decryption (provide secrecy)
• digital signatures (provide authentication)
• key exchange (of session keys)
• some algorithms are suitable for all uses, others are specific to one
 Public-Key Requirements

• Public-Key algorithms rely on two keys where:

• it is computationally infeasible to find decryption key knowing

only algorithm & encryption key
• it is computationally easy to en/decrypt messages when the
relevant (en/decrypt) key is known
• either of the two related keys can be used for encryption, with
the other used for decryption (for some algorithms)

• these are formidable requirements which only a few algorithms have

satisfied
Security of Public Key Schemes
like private key schemes brute force exhaustive search
attack is always theoretically possible
but keys used are too large (>512bits)
security relies on a large enough difference in difficulty
between easy (en/decrypt) and hard (crypt analyse)
problems
more generally the hard problem is known, but is made
hard enough to be impractical to break
requires the use of very large numbers
hence is slow compared to private key schemes
 RSA
by Rivest, Shamir & Adleman of MIT in 1977
best known & widely used public-key scheme
based on exponentiation in a finite (Galois) field over
integers modulo a prime
nb. exponentiation takes O((log n)3) operations (easy)
uses large integers (eg. 1024 bits)
security due to cost of factoring large numbers
nb. factorization takes O(e log n log log n) operations (hard)
 RSA En/decryption
• to encrypt a message M the sender:
• obtains public key of recipient PU={e,n}
• computes: C = Me mod n, where 0≤M<n
• to decrypt the ciphertext C the owner:
• uses their private key PR={d,n}
• computes: M = Cd mod n
• note that the message M must be smaller than the modulus n (block if
needed)
 RSA Key Setup

• each user generates a public/private key pair by:

• selecting two large primes at random: p, q
• computing their system modulus n=p.q
• note ø(n)=(p-1)(q-1)
• selecting at random the encryption key e
• where 1<e<ø(n), gcd(e,ø(n))=1
• solve following equation to find decryption key d
• e.d=1 mod ø(n) and 0≤d≤n
• publish their public encryption key: PU={e,n}
• keep secret private decryption key: PR={d,n}
Why RSA Works

• because of Euler's Theorem:

• aø(n)mod n = 1 where gcd(a,n)=1
• in RSA have:
• n=p.q
• ø(n)=(p-1)(q-1)
• carefully chose e & d to be inverses mod ø(n)
• hence e.d=1+k.ø(n) for some k
• hence :
Cd = Me.d = M1+k.ø(n) = M1.(Mø(n))k
= M1.(1)k = M1 = M mod n
 RSA Example - Key Setup

1. Select primes: p=17 & q=11

2. Calculate n = pq =17 x 11=187
3. Calculate ø(n)=(p–1)(q-1)=16x10=160
4. Select e: gcd(e,160)=1; choose e=7
5. Determine d: de=1 mod 160 and d < 160
Value is d=23 since 23x7=161= 10x160+1
6. Publish public key PU={7,187}
7. Keep secret private key PR={23,187}
RSA Example - En/Decryption

sample RSA encryption/decryption is:

given message M = 88 (nb. 88<187)
encryption:
C = 887 mod 187 = 11
decryption:
M = 1123 mod 187 = 88
Exponentiation

• can use the Square and Multiply Algorithm

• a fast, efficient algorithm for exponentiation
• concept is based on repeatedly squaring base
• and multiplying in the ones that are needed to
compute the result
• look at binary representation of exponent
• only takes O(log2 n) multiples for number n
• eg. 75 = 74.71 = 3.7 = 10 mod 11
• eg. 3129 = 3128.31 = 5.3 = 4 mod 11
Exponentiation

c = 0; f = 1
for i = k downto 0
do c = 2 x c
f = (f x f) mod n
if bi == 1 then
c=c+1
f = (f x a) mod n
return f
Efficient Encryption

• encryption uses exponentiation to power e

• hence if e small, this will be faster
• often choose e=65537 (216-1)
• also see choices of e=3 or e=17
• but if e too small (eg e=3) can attack
• using Chinese remainder theorem & 3 messages with different modulii
• if e fixed must ensure gcd(e,ø(n))=1
• ie reject any p or q not relatively prime to e
Efficient Decryption

• decryption uses exponentiation to power d

• this is likely large, insecure if not
• can use the Chinese Remainder Theorem (CRT) to compute mod p &
q separately. then combine to get desired answer
• approx 4 times faster than doing directly
• only owner of private key who knows values of p & q can use this
technique
RSA Key Generation

• users of RSA must:

• determine two primes at random - p, q
• select either e or d and compute the other
• primes p,q must not be easily derived from modulus n=p.q
• means must be sufficiently large
• typically guess and use probabilistic test
• exponents e, d are inverses, so use Inverse algorithm to compute
the other
RSA Security

• possible approaches to attacking RSA are:

• brute force key search - infeasible given size of numbers
• mathematical attacks - based on difficulty of computing ø(n), by factoring
modulus n
• timing attacks - on running of decryption
• chosen ciphertext attacks - given properties of RSA
Factoring Problem

• mathematical approach takes 3 forms:

• factor n=p.q, hence compute ø(n) and then d
• determine ø(n) directly and compute d
• find d directly
• currently believe all equivalent to factoring
• have seen slow improvements over the years
• as of May-05 best is 200 decimal digits (663) bit with LS
• biggest improvement comes from improved algorithm
• cf QS to GHFS to LS
• currently assume 1024-2048 bit RSA is secure
• ensure p, q of similar size and matching other constraints