Some Results on Distinguishing Attacks on Stream Ciphers

Stream ciphers are cryptographic primitives that are used to ensure the privacy of a message that is sent over a digital communication channel. In this thesis we will present new cryptanalytic results for several stream ciphers. The thesis provides a general introduction to cryptology, explains the basic concepts, gives an overview of various cryptographic primitives and discusses a number of different attack models. The first new attack given is a linear correlation attack in the form of a distinguishing attack. In this attack a specific class of weak feedback polynomials for LFSRs is identified. If the feedback polynomial is of a particular form the attack will be efficient. Two new distinguishing attacks are given on classical stream cipher constructions, namely the filter generator and the irregularly clocked filter generator. It is also demonstrated how these attacks can be applied to modern constructions. A key recovery attack is described for LILI-128 and a distinguishing attack for LILI-II is given. The European network of excellence, called eSTREAM, is an effort to find new efficient and secure stream ciphers. We analyze a number of the eSTREAM candidates. Firstly, distinguishing attacks are described for the candidate Dragon and a family of candidates called Pomaranch. Secondly, we describe resynchronization attacks on eSTREAM candidates. A general square root resynchronization attack which can be used to recover parts of a message is given. The attack is demonstrated on the candidates LEX and Pomaranch. A chosen IV distinguishing attack is then presented which can be used to evaluate the initialization procedure of stream ciphers. The technique is demonstrated on four candidates: Grain, Trivium, Decim and LEX

A Prototype Tool for Distinguishing Attacks and Technical Failures in Industrial Control Systems

Critical Infrastructures (CIs) are governed by Industrial Control Systems (ICSs). Modern ICSs do not operate in isolation anymore, but they are connected to the Internet. This transformation introduced numerous advantages, however, there are a few drawbacks as well. Integration with the Internet has left ICS exposed to potential cyber-attacks. Additionally, ICSs could also encounter technical failures during operation. Consequently, it is crucial to distinguish between attacks and technical failures to initiate an appropriate response. There is a deficiency of robust technology to assist operators in distinguishing attacks and technical failures in an ICS environment. However, a framework is proposed to construct Bayesian Network (BN) models that would help to distinguish between attacks and technical failures for different observable problems in our previous work. There are tools available to implement such BN models, but these tools are not appropriate to use in an ICS environment. In order to address this limitation, this paper develops and demonstrates a prototype tool for swift identification of the major cause (Intentional Attack/Accidental Technical Failure) in case of an abnormal behaviour in a component of ICS.The proposed tool enables BN models to automatically update prior probabilities based on the historical data and/or expert knowledge corresponding to the application. The developed tool can be further evaluated and used to distinguish between attacks and technical failures during operation in CIs where ICSs are employed

MAC Constructions: Security Bounds and Distinguishing Attacks

We provide a simple and improved security analysis of PMAC, a Parallelizable MAC (Message Authentication Code) defined over arbitrary messages. A similar kind of result was shown by Bellare, Pietrzak and Rogaway at Crypto 2005, where they have provided an improved bound for CBC (Cipher Block Chaining) MAC, which was introduced by Bellare, Killan and Rogaway at Crypto 1994. Our analysis idea is much more simpler to understand and is borrowed from the work by Nandi for proving Indistinguishability at Indocrypt 2005 and work by Bernstein. It shows that the advantage for any distinguishing attack for n-bit PMAC based on a random function is bounded by O(σq / 2^n), where σ is the total number of blocks in all q queries made by the attacker. In the original paper by Black and Rogaway at Eurocrypt 2002 where PMAC was introduced, the bound is O(σ^2 / 2^n). We also compute the collision probability of CBC MAC for suitably chosen messages. We show that the probability is Ω( lq^2 / N) where l is the number of message blocks, N is the size of the domain and q is the total number of queries. For random oracles the probability is O(q^2 / N). This improved collision probability will help us to have an efficient distinguishing attack and MAC-forgery attack. We also show that the collision probability for PMAC is Ω(q^2 / N) (strictly greater than the birthday bound). We have used a purely combinatorial approach to obtain this bound. Similar analysis can be made for other CBC MAC extensions like XCBC, TMAC and OMAC

General Distinguishing Attacks on NMAC and HMAC with Birthday Attack Complexity

Kim {\em et al}. \cite{KiBiPrHo06} and Contini {\em et al}. \cite{CoYi06} studied on the security of HMAC and NMAC based on HAVAL, MD4, MD5, SHA-0 and SHA-1. Especially, they considered the distinguishing attacks. However, they did not describe generic distinguishing attacks on NMAC and HMAC. In this paper, we describe the generic distinguishers to distinguish NMAC and HMAC with the birthday attack complexity and we prove the security bound when the underlying compression function is the random oracle

Quantum Distinguishing Attacks against Type-1 Generalized Feistel Ciphers

A generalized Feistel cipher is one of the methods to construct block ciphers, and it has several variants. Dong, Li, and Wang showed quantum distinguishing attacks against the $(2d-1)$-round Type-1 generalized Feistel cipher with quantum chosen-plaintext attacks, where $d\ge 3$, and they also showed key recovery attacks [Dong, Li, Wang. Sci China Inf Sci, 2019, 62(2): 022501]. In this paper, we show a polynomial time quantum distinguishing attack against the $(3d-3)$-round version, i.e., we improve the number of rounds by $(d-2)$. We also show a quantum distinguishing attack against the $(d^2-d+1)$-round version in the quantum chosen-ciphertext setting. We apply these quantum distinguishing attacks to obtain key recovery attacks against Type-1 generalized Feistel ciphers