kk-partial permutations and the center of the wreath product Sk≀Sn\mathcal{S}_k\wr \mathcal{S}_n algebra

We generalize the concept of partial permutations of Ivanov and Kerov and introduce $k$-partial permutations. This allows us to show that the structure coefficients of the center of the wreath product $\mathcal{S}_k\wr \mathcal{S}_n$ algebra are polynomials in $n$ with non-negative integer coefficients. We use a universal algebra $\mathcal{I}_\infty^k$ which projects on the center $Z(\mathbb{C}[\mathcal{S}_k\wr \mathcal{S}_n])$ for each $n.$ We show that $\mathcal{I}_\infty^k$ is isomorphic to the algebra of shifted symmetric functions on many alphabets

Short expressions of permutations as products and cryptanalysis of the Algebraic Eraser

On March 2004, Anshel, Anshel, Goldfeld, and Lemieux introduced the \emph{Algebraic Eraser} scheme for key agreement over an insecure channel, using a novel hybrid of infinite and finite noncommutative groups. They also introduced the \emph{Colored Burau Key Agreement Protocol (CBKAP)}, a concrete realization of this scheme. We present general, efficient heuristic algorithms, which extract the shared key out of the public information provided by CBKAP. These algorithms are, according to heuristic reasoning and according to massive experiments, successful for all sizes of the security parameters, assuming that the keys are chosen with standard distributions. Our methods come from probabilistic group theory (permutation group actions and expander graphs). In particular, we provide a simple algorithm for finding short expressions of permutations in $S_n$, as products of given random permutations. Heuristically, our algorithm gives expressions of length $O(n^2\log n)$, in time and space $O(n^3)$. Moreover, this is provable from \emph{the Minimal Cycle Conjecture}, a simply stated hypothesis concerning the uniform distribution on $S_n$. Experiments show that the constants in these estimations are small. This is the first practical algorithm for this problem for $n\ge 256$. Remark: \emph{Algebraic Eraser} is a trademark of SecureRF. The variant of CBKAP actually implemented by SecureRF uses proprietary distributions, and thus our results do not imply its vulnerability. See also arXiv:abs/12020598Comment: Final version, accepted to Advances in Applied Mathematics. Title slightly change