1 INTRODUCTION

Computer Security- generic name for the collection of tools designed to

protect data and to thwart hackers
Network Security- measures to protect data during their transmission
Internet Security - measures to protect data during their transmission over a
collection of interconnected networks
Security Attack - Any action that compromises the security of information
owned by an organization
Information security is abouthow to prevent attacks, or failing that, to
detect attacks on information-based systems
Passive Attacks- eavesdropping on, or monitoring of, transmissions to:
obtain message contents, or monitor traffic flows
Active Attacks modification of data stream to: masquerade of one entity as
some other; replay previous messages ; modify messages in transit ;
denial of service
Data integrity is assurance that the data that arrives is the sameas when it
was sent.
Confidentiality is assurance that sensitive information is not visible to an
eavesdropper. This is achieved using encryption. Confidentiality is difficult to
ensure but it is easiest to assess in terms of success.
Availability means data can be accessed whenever it is needed. It could be
any subset of these asset properties: Usefulness ; Sufficient capacity ;
Progressing at a proper place ; Completed in an acceptable period of time ;
We can say that an asset is available, if : There is timely request response.;
There is fair allocation of resources.; There is no total breakdown i.e. system
is fault tolerant.; It is easy to use in intended way. ; There is concurrency
control and dead lock control.
Non-repudiation is assurance that any transaction that takes place can
subsequently be proved to have taken place. Both the sender and the
receiver agree that the exchange took place.

Cryptography: Cryptography is the art of secret writing. Cryptography enables

to send information
between participants in a way that prevents others from
reading it. The following are some simple terms associated with cryptography:
Plaintext: A message in its original form is known as plaintextor cleartext.
Ciphertext:The mangled information is known as ciphertext.
Encryption: The process of producing ciphertext from plaintextis known as
encryption.
Encryption algorithm: The various substitution and transformations are
performed on plaintextin
cryptography by Encryption algorithm.

Key: The key is also input to Encryption algorithm. This has a value which is
independent of the plain text. The Encryption algorithm will provide a different
output depending on the key input to it.
Decryption: The reverse of encryption is called decryption. Decryption produces
plaintextfrom the ciphertext.
Decryption algorithm: This is the encryption algorithm run in reverse. It takes
the ciphertextand the corresponding key and produces the original plaintext.

The first models information flowing over an insecure communications channel,

in the presence of possible opponents. Hence an appropriate security
transform (encryption algorithm)can be used, with suitable keys, possibly
negotiated using the presence of a trusted third party.
Using this model requires us to: Design a suitable algorithm for the
security transformation ; Generate the secret information (keys) used by
the algorithm ; Develop methods to distribute and share the secret
information ; Specify a protocol enabling the principals to use the
transformation and secret information for a security service.

The second model is concerned with controlled access toinformation or

resources on a computer system, in the presence of possible opponents. Here
appropriate controls are needed on the access and within the system, to
provide suitable security. Some cryptographic techniques are useful here
also.

Using this model requires us to: Select appropriate gatekeeper functions

to identify users ; Implement security controls to ensure only authorized
users access designated information or resources ; Trusted computer
systems can be used to implement this model

Types of Cryptanalytic Attacks:

Ciphertext only - Only know algorithm / ciphertext, statistical, can

identify plaintext
Known plaintext - Know/suspect plaintext & ciphertext to attack cipher
Chosen plaintext - Select plaintext and obtain ciphertext to attack cipher
Chosen ciphertext - Select ciphertext and obtain plaintext to attack cipher
Chosen text - Select either plaintext or ciphertext to en/decrypt to
attack cipher
ITU-T X.800 Security Architecture for OSI : defines a systematic way of
defining and providing security requirements; for us it provides a useful,
if abstract, overview of concepts we will study.
Security Services - X.800 defines it as: a service provided by a protocol
layer of communicating open systems, which ensures adequate security
of the systems or of data transfers
RFC 2828 defines it as: a processing or communication service provided by
a system to give a specific kind of protection to system resources
5 categories of Security Services (X.800)
Authentication- assurance that the communicating entity is the one
claimed
Access Control- prevention of the unauthorized use of a resource
Data Confidentiality protection of data from unauthorized
disclosure
Data Integrity- assurance that data received is as sent by an
authorized entity
Non-Repudiation- protection against denial by one of the parties in
a communication
Security Mechanisms (X.800)

Specific Security Mechanisms: encipherment, digital signatures, access

controls, data integrity, authentication exchange, traffic padding,
routing control, notarization (is protocol specific)
Pervasive Security Mechanisms: trusted functionality, security labels,
event detection, security audit trails, security recovery (not protocol
specific)

2 CLASSICAL ENCRYPTION TECHNIQUES

All traditional schemes are symmetric/ single key/ private-key encryption

algorithms, with a single key, used for both encryption and decryption,
since both senderand receiver are equivalent, either can encrypt or
decrypt messages using that common key.
5 ingredients of the symmetric cipher model:

-plaintext
-encryption algorithm performs substitutions/transformations on
plaintext
-secret key control exact substitutions/transformations used in
encryption algorithm
-ciphertext
-decryption algorithm inverse of encryption algorithm

Requirements - two requirements for secure use of symmetric

encryption:
a strong encryption algorithm
a secret key known only to sender / receiver
Y = EK(X)
X = DK(Y)
assume encryption algorithm is known
implies a secure channel to distribute key

Cryptography can be characterized by:

type of encryption operations used
substitution / transposition / product
number of keys used
single-key or private/ two-key or public
way in which plaintext is processed
block / stream

unconditional security no matter how much computer power is available,

the cipher cannot be broken since the ciphertext provides insufficient
information to uniquely determine the corresponding plaintext

computational security given limited computing resources (eg time

needed for
calculations is greater than age of universe), the cipher cannot be
broken
Classical Substitution Ciphers - where letters of plaintext are replaced by
other letters
or by numbers or symbols ; or if plaintext is viewed as a sequence of
bits, then

substitution involves replacing plaintext bit patterns with ciphertext bit

patterns
Caesar Cipher - earliest known substitution cipher : by Julius Caesar ;
first attested use in military affairs ; replaces each letter by 3rd letter on ;
example: meet me after the toga party
PHHW PH DIWHU WKH WRJD SDUWB
Still call any cipher using a simple letter shift a caesar cipher, not just
those with shift 3.
Note: when letters are involved, the following conventions are used in this
course: Plaintext
is always in lowercase; ciphertext is in uppercase; key values are in
italicized lowercase.
can define transformation as:
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
DEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABC
mathematically give each letter a number
abcdefghijklm
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
nopqrstuvwxyZ
13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

then have Caesar cipher as:

C = E(p) = (p + k) mod (26)
p = D(C) = (C k) mod (26)
This mathematical description uses modulo arithmetic (ie clock
arithmetic). Here, when you reach Z you go back to A and start again. Mod
26 implies that when you reach 26, you use 0 instead (ie the letter after Z,
or 25+ 1 goes to A or 0).
Example: howdy (7,14,22,3,24) encrypted using key f (5) is MTBID
Monoalphabetic Cipher: rather than just shifting the alphabet ; could
shuffle (jumble) the letters arbitrarily ; each plaintext letter maps to a
different random ciphertext letter
hence key is 26 letters long. problem is language characteristics.
Plain: abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Cipher: DKVQFIBJWPESCXHTMYAUOLRGZN
Plaintext: ifwewishtoreplaceletters
Ciphertext: WIRFRWAJUHYFTSDVFSFUUFYA
Playfair Cipher: one approach to improving security was to encrypt
multiple letters . invented by Charles Wheatstone in 1854, but named
after his friend Baron Playfair.
Polyalphabetic Cipher : another approach to improving security is to
use multiple cipher alphabets , called polyalphabetic substitution ciphers;
makes cryptanalysis harder with more alphabets to guess and flatter
frequency distribution ; use a key to select which alphabet is used
for each letter of the message ; use each alphabet in turn ; repeat from
start after end of key is reached. This gives the attacker more work, since
many alphabets need to be guessed, and because
the frequency
distribution is more complex, since the same plaintext letter could be
replaced by several ciphertext letters, depending on which
alphabet is used.

Vignere Cipher: simplest polyalphabetic substitution cipher is the

Vigenre Cipher
effectively multiple caesar ciphers ; key is multiple letters long K = k1
k2 ... kd;
ith letter specifies ith alphabet to use ; use each alphabet in turn ; repeat
from start after d letters in message; decryption simply works in reverse.
Example: write the plaintext out
write the keyword repeated above it
use each key letter as a caesar cipher key
encrypt the corresponding plaintext letter
eg using keyword deceptive
key: deceptivedeceptivedeceptive
plaintext: wearediscoveredsaveyourself
ciphertext:ZICVTWQNGRZGVTWAVZHCQYGLMGJ
a Saint-Cyr Slide is a simple manual aid
a slide with repeated alphabet
line up plaintext 'A' with key letter, eg 'C'
then read off any mapping for key letter
can bend round into a cipher disk
if a truly random key as long as the message is used, the cipher will be
secure ; is unbreakable since ciphertext bears no statistical
relationship to the plaintext ; since for any plaintext& any ciphertext there
exists a key mapping one to other ; can only use the key once though;
have problem of safe distribution of key
It is an improvement using a random key that was truly as long as the
message, with no repetitions, which thus totally obscures the original
message. Since any plaintext can be mapped to any ciphertext given
some key, there is simply no way to determine which plaintext
corresponds to a specific instance of ciphertext.
Transposition or Permutation Ciphers:
these hide the message by
rearranging the letter order without altering the actual letters used ; can
recognise these since have the same frequency distribution as the
original text. The core idea is to rearrange the order of basic units
(letters/bytes/bits) without altering their actual values.
Rail Fence Cipher: write message letters out diagonally over a number of
rows ; then read off cipher row by row
eg. write message out as:
mematrhtgpry
etefeteoaat
giving ciphertext
MEMATRHTGPRYETEFETEOAAT
(with a rail fence of 2)
Row Transposition Cipher: a more complex scheme;
write
letters of
message out in rows over a specified number of columns ; then reorder
the columns according to some key before reading off the rows
Key: 3 4 2 1 5 6 7
Plaintext:
attackp
ostpone
duntilt
woamxyz
Ciphertext: TTNAAPTMTSUOAODWCOIXKNLYPETZ

Product Ciphers: ciphers using substitutions or transpositions are not

secure because of language characteristics. hence consider using several
ciphers in succession such as a substitution followed by a transposition. This
makes a new much harder cipher. A bridge from classical to modern ciphers.
Rotor Machines: before modern ciphers, rotor machines were most
common product cipher;
were widely used in WW2 German Enigma, Allied Hagelin, Japanese Purple ;
implemented a very complex, varying substitution cipher ; used a series
of cylinders, each giving one
substitution, which rotated and changed after each letter was encrypted ;
with 3 cylinders have 26 3 =17576 alphabets
Steganography: an alternative to encryption that
hides existence of
message; using only a subset of letters/words in a longer message
marked in some way
using invisible ink or hiding in LSB in graphic image
or sound file
But has drawbacks high overhead to hide relatively few info bits