Provably Secure Group Signature Schemes from Code-Based Assumptions

We solve an open question in code-based cryptography by introducing two provably secure group signature schemes from code-based assumptions. Our basic scheme satisfies the CPA-anonymity and traceability requirements in the random oracle model, assuming the hardness of the McEliece problem, the Learning Parity with Noise problem, and a variant of the Syndrome Decoding problem. The construction produces smaller key and signature sizes than the previous group signature schemes from lattices, as long as the cardinality of the underlying group does not exceed $2^{24}$, which is roughly comparable to the current population of the Netherlands. We develop the basic scheme further to achieve the strongest anonymity notion, i.e., CCA-anonymity, with a small overhead in terms of efficiency. The feasibility of two proposed schemes is supported by implementation results. Our two schemes are the first in their respective classes of provably secure groups signature schemes. Additionally, the techniques introduced in this work might be of independent interest. These are a new verifiable encryption protocol for the randomized McEliece encryption and a novel approach to design formal security reductions from the Syndrome Decoding problem.Comment: Full extension of an earlier work published in the proceedings of ASIACRYPT 201

Key-and-Signature Compact Multi-Signatures for Blockchain: A Compiler with Realizations

Multi-signature is a protocol where a set of signatures jointly sign a message so that the final signature is significantly shorter than concatenating individual signatures together. Recently, it finds applications in blockchain, where several users want to jointly authorize a payment through a multi-signature. However, in this setting, there is no centralized authority and it could suffer from a rogue key attack where the attacker can generate his own keys arbitrarily. Further, to minimize the storage on blockchain, it is desired that the aggregated public-key and the aggregated signature are both as short as possible. In this paper, we find a compiler that converts a kind of identification (ID) scheme (which we call a linear ID) to a multi-signature so that both the aggregated public-key and the aggregated signature have a size independent of the number of signers. Our compiler is provably secure. The advantage of our results is that we reduce a multi-party problem to a weakly secure two-party problem. We realize our compiler with two ID schemes. The first is Schnorr ID. The second is a new lattice-based ID scheme, which via our compiler gives the first regular lattice-based multi-signature scheme with key-and-signature compact without a restart during signing process

Analysis of code-based digital signature schemes

Digital signatures are in high demand because they allow authentication and non-repudiation. Existing digital signature systems, such as digital signature algorithm (DSA), elliptic curve digital signature algorithm (ECDSA), and others, are based on number theory problems such as discrete logarithmic problems and integer factorization problems. These recently used digital signatures are not secure with quantum computers. To protect against quantum computer attacks, many researchers propose digital signature schemes based on error-correcting codes such as linear, Goppa, polar, and so on. We studied 16 distinct papers based on various error-correcting codes and analyzed their various features such as signing and verification efficiency, signature size, public key size, and security against multiple attacks

A Provably Secure Short Signature Scheme from Coding Theory

Signatures with partially message recovery in which some parts of messages are not transmitted with signatures to make them shorter are useful where bandwidth is one of the crucial concern and especially in case of signing short messages in applications such as time stamping, certified email services and identitybased cryptosystems. In this paper, to have quantum-attackresistant short signatures, a signature scheme with partially message recovery from coding theory is proposed. The security of the proposed scheme is proved under Goppa Parametrized Bounded Decoding and the Goppa Code Distinguishing assumptions in the random oracle model. Relying on the partially message recovery property, the proposal is shorter than the Dallot signature scheme, the only provably secure and practical code-based signature scheme. We should highlight that our scheme can be used as a building block of code-based signature schemes with additional properties since it compared to Dallot signature scheme not only improves its communication overhead but also it preserves its signature efficiency

Heuristically secure threshold lattice-based cryptography schemes

In public-key encryption, a long-term private key can be an easy target for hacking and deserves extra protection. One way to enhance its security is to share the long-term private key among multiple (say n) distributed servers; any threshold number (t, t ≤ n) of these servers are needed to collectively use the shared private key without reconstructing it. As a result, an attacker who has compromised less than t servers will still not be able to reconstruct the shared private key. In this thesis, we studied threshold decryption schemes for lattice-based public-key en- cryption, which is one of the most promising post-quantum public-key encryption schemes. We developed threshold decryption schemes for Stinson’s, the standard NTRU, and NTRU with Ring Learning with Errors (R-LWE) cryptosystems. Prototype implementations were developed for validating the functionality of these threshold decryption schemes. Our de- signs achieve heuristic security, and its security is supported by mechanisms similar to that of R-LWE

An Efficient Code-Based Threshold Ring Signature Scheme with a Leader-Participant Model

Digital signature schemes with additional properties have broad applications, such as in protecting the identity of signers allowing a signer to anonymously sign a message in a group of signers (also known as a ring). While these number-theoretic problems are still secure at the time of this research, the situation could change with advances in quantum computing. There is a pressing need to design PKC schemes that are secure against quantum attacks. In this paper, we propose a novel code-based threshold ring signature scheme with a leader-participant model. A leader is appointed, who chooses some shared parameters for other signers to participate in the signing process. This leader-participant model enhances the performance because every participant including the leader could execute the decoding algorithm (as a part of signing process) upon receiving the shared parameters from the leader. The time complexity of our scheme is close to Courtois et al.’s (2001) scheme. The latter is often used as a basis to construct other types of code-based signature schemes. Moreover, as a threshold ring signature scheme, our scheme is as efficient as the normal code-based ring signature

SoK: Privacy-Preserving Signatures

Modern security systems depend fundamentally on the ability of users to authenticate their communications to other parties in a network. Unfortunately, cryptographic authentication can substantially undermine the privacy of users. One possible solution to this problem is to use privacy-preserving cryptographic authentication. These protocols allow users to authenticate their communications without revealing their identity to the verifier. In the non-interactive setting, the most common protocols include blind, ring, and group signatures, each of which has been the subject of enormous research in the security and cryptography literature. These primitives are now being deployed at scale in major applications, including Intel\u27s SGX software attestation framework. The depth of the research literature and the prospect of large-scale deployment motivate us to systematize our understanding of the research in this area. This work provides an overview of these techniques, focusing on applications and efficiency

A Survey on Exotic Signatures for Post-quantum Blockchain: Challenges and Research Directions

Blockchain technology provides efficient and secure solutions to various online activities by utilizing a wide range of cryptographic tools. In this article, we survey the existing literature on post-quantum secure digital signatures that possess exotic advanced features and that are crucial cryptographic tools used in the blockchain ecosystem for (1) account management, (2) consensus efficiency, (3) empowering scriptless blockchain, and (4) privacy. The exotic signatures that we particularly focus on in this work are the following: multi-/aggregate, threshold, adaptor, blind, and ring signatures. Herein the term "exotic"refers to signatures with properties that are not just beyond the norm for signatures, e.g., unforgeability, but also imbue new forms of functionalities. Our treatment of such exotic signatures includes discussions on existing challenges and future research directions in the post-quantum space. We hope that this article will help to foster further research to make post-quantum cryptography more accessible so that blockchain systems can be made ready in advance of the approaching quantum threats