International Association for Cryptologic Research

# IACR News Central

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2012-06-06
05:16 [PhD][New]

Name: Rayanki Balakrishna
Topic: Multihop Performace Issuess in Wire less Mobile Ad Hoc networks
Category: implementation

05:15 [PhD][New]

Name: U.Rajeswar Rao

2012-06-05
20:52 [Event][Update]

Submission: 3 July 2012
From November 2 to November 3
Location: Chennai, India

18:17 [Pub][ePrint]

A visual cryptography scheme (VCS) is a secret sharing method, for which the secret can be decoded by human eyes without needing any cryptography knowledge nor any computation. Variance is first introduced by Hou et al. in 2005 and then thoroughly verified by Liu et al. in 2012 to evaluate the visual quality of size invariant VCS. In this paper, we introduce the idea of using variance as an error-detection measurement, by which we find the security defect of Hou et al.\'s multi-pixel encoding method. On the other hand, we find that variance not only effects the visual quality of size invariant VCS, but also effects the

visual quality of VCS. At last, average contrast associated with variance is used as a new criterion to evaluate the visual quality of VCS.

18:17 [Pub][ePrint]

In this paper we show that the recent technique of computationally complete symbolic attackers proposed by Bana and Comon-Lundh for computationally sound verification is powerful enough to verify actual protocols, such as the Needham-Schroeder-Lowe Protocol. In their model, one does not define explicit Dolev-Yao adversarial capabilities but rather the limitations of the adversarial capabilities. In this paper we present a set of axioms sufficient to show that no symbolic adversary compliant with these axioms can successfully violate secrecy or authentication in case of the NSL protocol. Hence all implementations for which these axioms are sound - namely, implementations using CCA2 encryption, and satisfying a minimal parsing requirement for pairing - exclude the possibility of successful computational attacks.

18:17 [Pub][ePrint]

Recent years have seen significant progress in the development of lightweight symmetric cryptoprimitives. The main concern of the designers of these primitives has been to minimize the number of gate equivalents (GEs) of the hardware implementation. However, there are numerous additional requirements that are present in real-life RFID systems. We give an overview of requirements emerging or already present in the widely deployed EPCGlobal Gen2 and ISO / IEC 18000-63 passive UHF RFID air interface standards. Lightweight stateful authenticated encryption algorithms seem to offer the most complete set of features for this purpose. In this work we give a Gen2-focused \"lessons learned\" overview of the challenges and related developments in RFID cryptography and propose what we see as appropriate design criteria for a cipher (dubbed \"Do-It-All-Cipher\" or DIAC) in this application area. We also comment on the applicability of NSA\'s new SIMON and SPECK proposals for this purpose.

18:17 [Pub][ePrint]

There is a flaw in the standard security definitions used in the literature on provable concrete security. The definitions are frequently conjectured to assign a security level of 2^128 to AES, the NIST P-256 elliptic curve, DSA-3072, RSA-3072, and various higher-level protocols, but they actually assign a far lower security level to each of these primitives and protocols. This flaw undermines security evaluations and comparisons throughout the literature. This paper analyzes the magnitude of the flaw in detail and discusses several strategies for fixing the definitions.

18:17 [Pub][ePrint]

We consider the class of secret sharing schemes where there is no a priori bound on the number of players $n$ but where each of the $n$ share-spaces has fixed cardinality~$q$. We show two fundamental lower bounds on the {\\em threshold gap} of such schemes.

The threshold gap $g$ is defined as $r-t$, where $r$ is minimal and $t$ is maximal such that

the following holds: for a secret with arbitrary a priori distribution, each $r$-subset of players can

reconstruct this secret from their joint shares without error ($r$-reconstruction) and the information

gain about the secret is nil for each $t$-subset of players jointly ($t$-privacy).

Our first bound, which is completely general, implies that if \$1\\leq t

05:55 [Job][New]

We invite applications for outstanding researchers to strengthen and broaden our research activities in security research. Our expertise ranges from applied cryptography and privacy to network, system, and usable security. Both recent Ph.D. graduates and well-established scientists are encouraged to apply.

A premier center for commercial innovation, PARC, a Xerox company, is in the business of breakthroughs. We work closely with global enterprises, entrepreneurs, government agencies and partners, and other clients to invent, co-develop, and bring to market game-changing innovations by combining imagination, investigation, and return on investment for our clients. For 40 years, we have lived at the leading edge of innovation, merging inquiry and strategy to pioneer technological change. PARC was incorporated in 2002 as a wholly owned independent subsidiary of Xerox Corporation – enabling us to continue pioneering technological change but across a broader set of industries and clients today.

Depending on seniority, the successful candidate will be responsible for one or more of the following roles:

. Formulating research problems based on real-world needs and independently conducting high-quality research

. Working with existing research and development staff on a broad range of research topics

. Working with business development team in identifying important business opportunities with industry and government agencies.

. Identifying new promising research directions and contributing them to the group’s long-term research agenda.

Candidates in all areas of cyber security will be considered, however, the following areas are of particular interest:

. Systems & network security

. Security in cloud computing

. Data mining and machine learning applied to security and privacy

. Security and privacy in ubiquitous and mobile computing environments

. Formal methods and software

2012-06-04
04:59 [PhD][New]

Name: Erik Tews
Topic: DECT Security Analysis
Category: applications

Description: DECT is a standard for cordless phones. The intent of this thesis is to evaluate DECT security in a comprehensive way. To secure conversations over the air, DECT uses two proprietary algorithms, namely the DECT Standard Authentication Algorithm (DSAA) for authentication and key derivation, and the DECT Standard Cipher (DSC) for encryption. Both algorithms have been kept secret and were only available to DECT device manufacturers under a None Disclosure Agreement (NDA). The reader is first introduced into the DECT standard. The two algorithms DSAA and DSC have been reverse engineered and are then described in full detail. At first, attacks against DECT devices are presented, that are based on faults made by the manufacturers while implementing the DECT standard. In the next Chapters, attacks against the DSAA and the DSC algorithm are described, that recover the secret keys used by these algorithms faster than by brute force. Thereafter, a attack against the DECT radio protocol is described, that decrypts encrypted DECT voice calls. Finally, an outlook over the next release of the DECT standard is presented, that is expected to counter all attacks against DECT, that are described in this thesis.[...]

04:59 [PhD][New]

Name: Johannes Buchmann