Cryptography and
Network Security
Chapter 11
Fourth Edition
by William Stallings
Lecture slides by Lawrie Brown
Chapter 11 – Message
Authentication and Hash
Functions
Message Authentication
message authentication is concerned with:
protecting the integrity of a message
validating identity of originator
non-repudiation of origin (dispute resolution)
will consider the security requirements
then three alternative functions used:
message encryption
message authentication code (MAC)
hash function
Security Requirements
disclosure
traffic
analysis
masquerade
content modification
sequence modification
timing modification
source repudiation
destination repudiation
Message Authentication Code
(MAC)
generated by an algorithm that creates a
small fixed-sized block
depending on both message and some key
like encryption though need not be reversible
appended to message as a signature
receiver performs same computation on
message and checks it matches the MAC
provides assurance that message is
unaltered and comes from sender
Message Authentication Code
Message Authentication
Codes
as shown the MAC provides authentication
can also use encryption for secrecy
generally use separate keys for each
can compute MAC either before or after encryption
is generally regarded as better done before
why use a MAC?
sometimes only authentication is needed
sometimes need authentication to persist longer than
the encryption (eg. archival use)
note that a MAC is not a digital signature
MAC Properties
a MAC is a cryptographic checksum
MAC = CK(M)
condenses a variable-length message M
using a secret key K
to a fixed-sized authenticator
is a many-to-one function
potentially many messages have same MAC
but finding these needs to be very difficult
Requirements for MACs
taking into account the types of attacks
need the MAC to satisfy the following:
1. knowing a message and MAC, is infeasible
to find another message with same MAC
2. MACs should be uniformly distributed
3. MAC should depend equally on all bits of the
message
Using Symmetric Ciphers for
MACs
can use any block cipher chaining mode
and use final block as a MAC
Data Authentication Algorithm (DAA) is
a widely used MAC based on DES-CBC
using IV=0 and zero-pad of final block
encrypt message using DES in CBC mode
and send just the final block as the MAC
• or the leftmost M bits (16≤M≤64) of final block
but final MAC is now too small for security
Data Authentication Algorithm
Hash Functions
condenses arbitrary message to fixed size
h = H(M)
usuallyassume that the hash function is
public and not keyed
cf. MAC which is keyed
hash used to detect changes to message
can use in various ways with message
most often to create a digital signature
Hash Functions & Digital
Signatures
Requirements for Hash
Functions
1. can be applied to any sized message M
2. produces fixed-length output h
3. is easy to compute h=H(M) for any message M
4. given h is infeasible to find x s.t. H(x)=h
•
one-way property
5. given x is infeasible to find y s.t. H(y)=H(x)
•
weak collision resistance
6. is infeasible to find any x,y s.t. H(y)=H(x)
•
strong collision resistance
Simple Hash Functions
are several proposals for simple functions
based on XOR of message blocks
not secure since can manipulate any
message and either not change hash or
change hash also
need a stronger cryptographic function
(next chapter)
Birthday Attacks
might think a 64-bit hash is secure
but by Birthday Paradox is not
birthday attack works thus:
m/
opponent generates 2 variations of a valid message
2
all with essentially the same meaning
m
opponent also generates 2 /2 variations of a desired
fraudulent message
two sets of messages are compared to find pair with
same hash (probability > 0.5 by birthday paradox)
have user sign the valid message, then substitute the
forgery which will have a valid signature
conclusion is that need to use larger MAC/hash
Hash and MAC Algorithms
Hash Functions
condense arbitrary size message to fixed size
by processing message in blocks
through some compression function
either custom or block cipher based
Message Authentication Code (MAC)
fixed sized authenticator for some message
to provide authentication for message
by using block cipher mode or hash function
Hash Algorithm Structure
Hash Algorithm Structure
Secure Hash Algorithm
SHA originally designed by NIST & NSA in 1993
was revised in 1995 as SHA-1
US standard for use with DSA signature scheme
standard is FIPS 180-1 1995, also Internet RFC3174
nb. the algorithm is SHA, the standard is SHS
based on design of MD4 with key differences
produces 160-bit hash values
recent 2005 results on security of SHA-1 have
raised concerns on its use in future applications
Revised Secure Hash
Standard
NIST issued revision FIPS 180-2 in 2002
adds 3 additional versions of SHA
SHA-256, SHA-384, SHA-512
designed for compatibility with increased
security provided by the AES cipher
structure & detail is similar to SHA-1
hence analysis should be similar
but security levels are rather higher
SHA-512 Overview
SHA-512 Compression
Function
heartof the algorithm
processing message in 1024-bit blocks
consists of 80 rounds
updating a 512-bit buffer
using a 64-bit value Wt derived from the
current message block
and a round constant based on cube root of
first 80 prime numbers
SHA-512 Round Function
SHA-512 Round Function
Block Ciphers as Hash
Functions
can use block ciphers as hash functions
using H0=0 and zero-pad of final block
compute: Hi = EMi [Hi-1]
and use final block as the hash value
similar to CBC but without a key
resulting hash is too small (64-bit)
both due to direct birthday attack
and to “meet-in-the-middle” attack
other variants also susceptible to attack
Hash Functions & MAC
Security
like
block ciphers have:
brute-force attacks exploiting
m/
strong collision resistance hash have cost 2 2
• have proposal for h/w MD5 cracker
• 128-bit hash looks vulnerable, 160-bits better
MACs with known message-MAC pairs
• can either attack keyspace (cf key search) or MAC
• at least 128-bit MAC is needed for security
Hash Functions & MAC
Security
cryptanalytic attacks exploit structure
like block ciphers want brute-force attacks to be the
best alternative
have a number of analytic attacks on iterated
hash functions
CVi = f[CVi-1, Mi]; H(M)=CVN
typically focus on collisions in function f
like block ciphers is often composed of rounds
attacks exploit properties of round functions
Summary
have considered:
message authentication using
message encryption
MACs
hash functions
general approach & security