Steganography from weak cryptography

We introduce a problem setting which we call ``the freedom fighters' problem''. It subtly differs from the prisoners' problem. We propose a steganographic method that allows Alice and Bob to fool Wendy the warden in this setting. Their messages are hidden in encryption keys. The recipient has no prior knowledge of these keys, and has to cryptanalyze ciphertexts in order to recover them. We show an example of the protocol and give a partial security analysis

The entropy of keys derived from laser speckle

Laser speckle has been proposed in a number of papers as a high-entropy source of unpredictable bits for use in security applications. Bit strings derived from speckle can be used for a variety of security purposes such as identification, authentication, anti-counterfeiting, secure key storage, random number generation and tamper protection. The choice of laser speckle as a source of random keys is quite natural, given the chaotic properties of speckle. However, this same chaotic behaviour also causes reproducibility problems. Cryptographic protocols require either zero noise or very low noise in their inputs; hence the issue of error rates is critical to applications of laser speckle in cryptography. Most of the literature uses an error reduction method based on Gabor filtering. Though the method is successful, it has not been thoroughly analysed. In this paper we present a statistical analysis of Gabor-filtered speckle patterns. We introduce a model in which perturbations are described as random phase changes in the source plane. Using this model we compute the second and fourth order statistics of Gabor coefficients. We determine the mutual information between perturbed and unperturbed Gabor coefficients and the bit error rate in the derived bit string. The mutual information provides an absolute upper bound on the number of secure bits that can be reproducibly extracted from noisy measurements

Optimal symmetric Tardos traitor tracing schemes

For the Tardos traitor tracing scheme, we show that by combining the symbol-symmetric accusation function of Skoric et al. with the improved analysis of Blayer and Tassa we get further improvements. Our construction gives codes that are up to 4 times shorter than Blayer and Tassa's, and up to 2 times shorter than the codes from Skoric et al. Asymptotically, we achieve the theoretical optimal codelength for Tardos' distribution function and the symmetric score function. For large coalitions, our codelengths are asymptotically about 4.93% of Tardos' original codelengths, which also improves upon results from Nuida et al.Comment: 16 pages, 1 figur

The fractional quantum Hall effect: Chern-Simons mapping, duality, Luttinger liquids and the instanton vacuum

We derive, from first principles, the complete Luttinger liquid theory of abelian quantum Hall edge states. This theory includes the effects of disorder and Coulomb interactions as well as the coupling to external electromagnetic fields. We introduce a theory of spatially separated (individually conserved) edge modes, find an enlarged dual symmetry and obtain a complete classification of quasiparticle operators and tunneling exponents. The chiral anomaly on the edge and Laughlin's gauge argument are used to obtain unambiguously the Hall conductance. In resolving the problem of counter flowing edge modes, we find that the long range Coulomb interactions play a fundamental role. In order to set up a theory for arbitrary filling fractions $\nu$ we use the idea of a two dimensional network of percolating edge modes. We derive an effective, single mode Luttinger liquid theory for tunneling processes into the quantum Hall edge which yields a continuous tunneling exponent $1/\nu$. The network approach is also used to re-derive the instanton vacuum or $Q$-theory for the plateau transitions.Comment: 36 pages, 7 figures (eps

Flow-based reputation: more than just ranking

The last years have seen a growing interest in collaborative systems like electronic marketplaces and P2P file sharing systems where people are intended to interact with other people. Those systems, however, are subject to security and operational risks because of their open and distributed nature. Reputation systems provide a mechanism to reduce such risks by building trust relationships among entities and identifying malicious entities. A popular reputation model is the so called flow-based model. Most existing reputation systems based on such a model provide only a ranking, without absolute reputation values; this makes it difficult to determine whether entities are actually trustworthy or untrustworthy. In addition, those systems ignore a significant part of the available information; as a consequence, reputation values may not be accurate. In this paper, we present a flow-based reputation metric that gives absolute values instead of merely a ranking. Our metric makes use of all the available information. We study, both analytically and numerically, the properties of the proposed metric and the effect of attacks on reputation values

Flow-based reputation with uncertainty: Evidence-Based Subjective Logic

The concept of reputation is widely used as a measure of trustworthiness based on ratings from members in a community. The adoption of reputation systems, however, relies on their ability to capture the actual trustworthiness of a target. Several reputation models for aggregating trust information have been proposed in the literature. The choice of model has an impact on the reliability of the aggregated trust information as well as on the procedure used to compute reputations. Two prominent models are flow-based reputation (e.g., EigenTrust, PageRank) and Subjective Logic based reputation. Flow-based models provide an automated method to aggregate trust information, but they are not able to express the level of uncertainty in the information. In contrast, Subjective Logic extends probabilistic models with an explicit notion of uncertainty, but the calculation of reputation depends on the structure of the trust network and often requires information to be discarded. These are severe drawbacks. In this work, we observe that the `opinion discounting' operation in Subjective Logic has a number of basic problems. We resolve these problems by providing a new discounting operator that describes the flow of evidence from one party to another. The adoption of our discounting rule results in a consistent Subjective Logic algebra that is entirely based on the handling of evidence. We show that the new algebra enables the construction of an automated reputation assessment procedure for arbitrary trust networks, where the calculation no longer depends on the structure of the network, and does not need to throw away any information. Thus, we obtain the best of both worlds: flow-based reputation and consistent handling of uncertainties

The problem of Coulomb interactions in the theory of the quantum Hall effect

We summarize the main ingredients of a unifying theory for abelian quantum Hall states. This theory combines the Finkelstein approach to localization and interaction effects with the topological concept of an instanton vacuum as well as Chern-Simons gauge theory. We elaborate on the meaning of a new symmetry ($\cal F$ invariance) for systems with an infinitely ranged interaction potential. We address the renormalization of the theory and present the main results in terms of a scaling diagram of the conductances.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Proceedings of the International Conference "Mesoscopics and Strongly Correlated Electron Systems", July 2000, Chernogolovka, Russi

The Library That Almost Wasn\u27t

The evolution of the CSUMB library, from its original conception as a \u27virtual library\u27 in 1994 through the planning and construction of a physical library that opened in 2008