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Cryptology

Chapter 8 of 'Principles of Information Security' discusses cryptography, covering the processes of encryption and decryption, key sizes, and various cryptographic algorithms. It highlights the importance of Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI), digital signatures, and secure communication protocols like SSL and PGP. The chapter also addresses potential attacks on cryptosystems and the evolution of cryptographic methods to enhance security.

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Toboso Oyengo
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1 views

Cryptology

Chapter 8 of 'Principles of Information Security' discusses cryptography, covering the processes of encryption and decryption, key sizes, and various cryptographic algorithms. It highlights the importance of Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI), digital signatures, and secure communication protocols like SSL and PGP. The chapter also addresses potential attacks on cryptosystems and the evolution of cryptographic methods to enhance security.

Uploaded by

Toboso Oyengo
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Principles of

InformationSecurity,
Fourth Edition
Yet it may roundly be asserted that human ingenuity cannot
concoct a cipher which human ingenuity cannot resolve.

Chapter 8
Cryptography
• Encryption is the process of converting a message into a form
that is unreadable to unauthorized individuals.
• The science of encryption, known as cryptology, encompasses
cryptography (making and using encryption codes) and
cryptanalysis (breaking encryption codes).
• Cryptology has a long history and continues to change and
improve.
………
• Two basic processing methods are used to convert plaintext data
into encrypted data—bit stream and block ciphering. The other
major methods used for scrambling data include substitution
ciphers, transposition ciphers, XOR function, Vigenère cipher, and
the Vernam cipher.
• The strength of many encryption applications and cryptosystems is
determined by key size. All other things being equal, the length of
the key directly affects the strength of the encryption.
• Hash functions are mathematical algorithms that generate a
message summary, or digest, that can be used to confirm the
identity of a specific message and to confirm that the message has
not been altered.
…….
• Most cryptographic algorithms can be grouped into two broad
categories, symmetric and asymmetric. In practice, most popular
cryptosystems are hybrids that combine symmetric and asymmetric
algorithms.
• Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI) is an integrated system of software,
encryption methodologies, protocols, legal agreements, and third-
party services that enables users communicate securely. PKI
includes digital certificates and certificate authorities.
……….
• Digital signatures are encrypted messages that are independently
verified by a central facility, and which provide nonrepudiation. A
digital certificate is an electronic document, similar to a digital
signature, that is attached to a file to certify that the file is from the
organization it claims to be from and has not been modified from its
original format.
• Steganography is the hiding of information, and while it is not
properly a form of cryptography, like cryptography it is used to
protect confidential information while in transit.
………..
• S-HTTP (Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol), Secure Electronic
Transactions (SET), and SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) are protocols
designed to enable secure communications across the Internet.
IPSec is the protocol used to secure communications across any IP-
based network such as LANs, WANs, and the Internet.
• Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME), Privacy
Enhanced Mail (PEM), and Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) are protocols
that are used to secure electronic mail.
• PGP is a hybrid cryptosystem that combines some of the best
available cryptographic algorithms and has become the open source
de facto standard for encryption and authentication of e-mail and
file storage applications.
………..

• Wireless networks require their own cryptographic protection.


Originally protected with WEP and WPA, most modern Wi-Fi
networks are now protected with WPA2.
• Bluetooth—a short-range wireless protocol used predominantly for
wireless phones and PDAs—can be exploited by anyone within its
30-foot range.
……
• Unauthorized attempts to access to secure communications often
use brute force or ciphertext attacks that perform frequency
analysis on the encoded text.
• Therefore, modern algorithms attempt to remove the repetitive
and predictable statistical bias from the ciphertext.
• If attackers obtain duplicate texts, one in ciphertext and one in
plaintext, they can reverse-engineer the encryption algorithm.
• This is referred to as a known-plaintext attack or a selected-
plaintext attack.
• Attacks against cryptosystems include the man-in-the-middle
attack, correlation attacks, dictionary attacks, and timing attacks.
• Most well-known encryption methods are released to the
information and computer security communities for testing,
which leads to the development of more secure algorithms.
Review Questions
• What are cryptography and cryptanalysis?
• What were some of the first uses of cryptography?
• What is a key, and what is it used for?
• What are the three basic operations in cryptography?
• What is a hash function, and what can it be used for?
• Why is it important to exchange keys out of band in symmetric
encryption?
…….
• What is the fundamental difference between symmetric and
asymmetric encryption?
• How does Public-Key Infrastructure protect information
assets?
• What are the six components of PKI?
• What is the difference between digital signatures and digital
certificates?
• What drawbacks to symmetric and asymmetric encryption
are resolved by using a hybrid method like Diffie-Hellman?
• What is steganography, and what can it be used for?
• Which security protocols are predominantly used in Web-
based electronic commerce?
…….
• Which security protocols are used to protect e-mail?
• IPSec can be used in two modes. What are they?
• Which kind of attack on cryptosystems involves using a collection
of pre-identified terms? Which kind of attack involves sequential
guessing of all possible key combinations?
• If you were setting up an encryption-based network, what size
key would you choose and why?
• What is the average key size of a strong encryption system in use
today?
• What is the standard for encryption currently recommended by
NIST?
• What is the most popular symmetric encryption system used
over the Web? The most popular asymmetric system? Hybrid
system?

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