Concurrent Knowledge-Extraction in the Public-Key Model

Knowledge extraction is a fundamental notion, modelling machine possession of values (witnesses) in a computational complexity sense. The notion provides an essential tool for cryptographic protocol design and analysis, enabling one to argue about the internal state of protocol players without ever looking at this supposedly secret state. However, when transactions are concurrent (e.g., over the Internet) with players possessing public-keys (as is common in cryptography), assuring that entities ``know'' what they claim to know, where adversaries may be well coordinated across different transactions, turns out to be much more subtle and in need of re-examination. Here, we investigate how to formally treat knowledge possession by parties (with registered public-keys) interacting over the Internet. Stated more technically, we look into the relative power of the notion of ``concurrent knowledge-extraction'' (CKE) in the concurrent zero-knowledge (CZK) bare public-key (BPK) model.Comment: 38 pages, 4 figure

Four-Round Concurrent Non-Malleable Commitments from One-Way Functions

How many rounds and which assumptions are required for concurrent non-malleable commitments? The above question has puzzled researchers for several years. Pass in [TCC 2013] showed a lower bound of 3 rounds for the case of black-box reductions to falsifiable hardness assumptions with respect to polynomial-time adversaries. On the other side, Goyal [STOC 2011], Lin and Pass [STOC 2011] and Goyal et al. [FOCS 2012] showed that one-way functions (OWFs) are sufficient with a constant number of rounds. More recently Ciampi et al. [CRYPTO 2016] showed a 3-round construction based on subexponentially strong one-way permutations. In this work we show as main result the first 4-round concurrent non-malleable commitment scheme assuming the existence of any one-way function. Our approach builds on a new security notion for argument systems against man-in-the-middle attacks: Simulation-Witness-Independence. We show how to construct a 4-round one-many simulation-witnesses-independent argument system from one-way functions. We then combine this new tool in parallel with a weak form of non-malleable commitments constructed by Goyal et al. in [FOCS 2014] obtaining the main result of our work

Resettable Zero Knowledge in the Bare Public-Key Model under Standard Assumption

In this paper we resolve an open problem regarding resettable zero knowledge in the bare public-key (BPK for short) model: Does there exist constant round resettable zero knowledge argument with concurrent soundness for $\mathcal{NP}$ in BPK model without assuming \emph{sub-exponential hardness}? We give a positive answer to this question by presenting such a protocol for any language in $\mathcal{NP}$ in the bare public-key model assuming only collision-resistant hash functions against \emph{polynomial-time} adversaries.Comment: 19 pag

Improved Black-Box Constructions of Composable Secure Computation

We close the gap between black-box and non-black-box constructions of $\mathit{composable}$ secure multiparty computation in the plain model under the $\mathit{minimal}$ assumption of semi-honest oblivious transfer. The notion of protocol composition we target is $\mathit{angel\text{-}based}$ security, or more precisely, security with super-polynomial helpers. In this notion, both the simulator and the adversary are given access to an oracle called an $\mathit{angel}$ that can perform some predefined super-polynomial time task. Angel-based security maintains the attractive properties of the universal composition framework while providing meaningful security guarantees in complex environments without having to trust anyone. Angel-based security can be achieved using non-black-box constructions in $\max(R_{\mathsf{OT}},\widetilde{O}(\log n))$ rounds where $R_{\mathsf{OT}}$ is the round-complexity of the semi-honest oblivious transfer. However, currently, the best known $\mathit{black\text{-}box}$ constructions under the same assumption require $\max(R_{\mathsf{OT}},\widetilde{O}(\log^2 n))$ rounds. If $R_{\mathsf{OT}}$ is a constant, the gap between non-black-box and black-box constructions can be a multiplicative factor $\log n$. We close this gap by presenting a $\max(R_{\mathsf{OT}},\widetilde{O}(\log n))$-round black-box construction. We achieve this result by constructing constant-round 1-1 CCA-secure commitments assuming only black-box access to one-way functions

Concurrent Non-Malleable Commitments (and More) in 3 Rounds

The round complexity of commitment schemes secure against man-in-the-middle attacks has been the focus of extensive research for about 25 years. The recent breakthrough of Goyal et al. [22] showed that 3 rounds are sufficient for (one-left, one-right) non-malleable commitments. This result matches a lower bound of [41]. The state of affairs leaves still open the intriguing problem of constructing 3-round concurrent non-malleable commitment schemes. In this paper we solve the above open problem by showing how to transform any 3-round (one-left one-right) non-malleable commitment scheme (with some extractability property) in a 3-round concurrent nonmalleable commitment scheme. Our transform makes use of complexity leveraging and when instantiated with the construction of [22] gives a 3-round concurrent non-malleable commitment scheme from one-way permutations secure w.r.t. subexponential-time adversaries. We also show a 3-round arguments of knowledge and a 3-round identification scheme secure against concurrent man-in-the-middle attacks

Delayed-Input Non-Malleable Zero Knowledge and Multi-Party Coin Tossing in Four Rounds

In this work we start from the following two results in the state-of-the art: 1.4-round non-malleable zero knowledge (NMZK): Goyal et al. in FOCS 2014 showed the first 4-round one-one NMZK argument from one-way functions (OWFs). Their construction requires the prover to know the instance and the witness already at the 2nd round.2.4-round multi-party coin tossing (MPCT): Garg et al. in Eurocrypt 2016 showed the first 4-round protocol for MPCT. Their result crucially relies on 3-round 3-robust parallel non-malleable commitments. So far there is no candidate construction for such a commitment scheme under standard polynomial-time hardness assumptions. We improve the state-of-the art on NMZK and MPCT by presenting the following two results: 1.a delayed-input 4-round one-many NMZK argument IINMZKfrom OWFs; moreover IINMZKis also a delayed-input many-many synchronous NMZK argument.2.a 4-round MPCT protocol IIMPCTfrom one-to-one OWFs; IIMPCTuses IINMZKas subprotocol and exploits the special properties (e.g., delayed input, many-many synchronous) of IINMZK. Both IINMZKand IIMPCTmake use of a special proof of knowledge that offers additional security guarantees when played in parallel with other protocols. The new technique behind such a proof of knowledge is an additional contribution of this work and is of independent interest

Adaptive Security of Concurrent Non-Malleable Zero-Knowledge

A zero-knowledge protocol allows a prover to convince a verifier the correctness of a statement without disclosing any other information to the verifier. It is a basic tool and widely used in many other cryptographic applications. However, when stand-alone zero-knowledge protocols are used in complex environments, e.g., the Internet, the basic properties may not be sufficient. This is why researchers considered security of zero-knowledge protocols under concurrent composition and man-in-the-middle attacks. Moreover, it is more likely that an adversary might break computers that run the protocol and get internal information of the parties. It is thus very necessary to take account of the security of zero-knowledge protocols when adaptive corruptions are allowed. Previous adaptively secure zero-knowledge protocols work either in a stand-alone setting, or in a concurrent setting with trusted setup assumptions. In this paper, we study adaptive security of zero-knowledge protocols under both concurrent self composition and man-in-the-middle attacks in the plain model (i.e., without any set-up assumptions). We provide a construction of adaptively secure concurrent non-malleable zero-knowledge proof/argument for every language in NP

Statistical Concurrent Non-malleable Zero-knowledge from One-way Functions

Concurrent non-malleable zero-knowledge (CNMZK) protocols are zero-knowledge protocols that provides security even when adversaries interacts with multiple provers and verifiers simultaneously. It is known that CNMZK arguments for NP can be constructed in the plain model. Furthermore, it was recently shown that statistical CNMZK arguments for NP can also be constructed in the plain model. However, although the former requires only the existence of one-way functions, the latter requires the DDH assumption. In this paper, we construct a statistical CNMZK argument for NP assuming only the existence of one-way functions. The security is proven via black-box simulation, and the round complexity is poly(n). Furthermore, under the existence of collision-resistant hash functions, the round complexity is reduced to w(log n), which is essentially optimal for black-box concurrent zero-knowledge protocols