NOTE: This assignment will carry weight for 2 assignments.
1 A stream cipher uses a LFSR with three units. An attacker captures a ciphertext “0101001010011”. The attacker knows that the first 6 bits of the message are “110001.” Using that information, the attacker defeats this encryption, i.e., he is able to determine the initial seed values (S1, S2 and S3) and Keys (K1, K2 and K3). What are those values? (Points 25)
Calculation Hints:
Remember:
S1 through S6 can be computed by XORing 6 bit message with the first 6 bits of ciphertext.Then formulate the following equations for S4 through S6 :
Sm+1= Sm× Km + Sm-1× Km-1 + …… S2× K2 + S1× K1 mod 2
Sm+2= Sm+1× Km + Sm× Km-1 + …… S3× K2 + S2× K1 mod 2
Sm+3= Sm+2× Km + Sm+1× Km-1 + …… S4× K2 + S3× K1 mod 2
Number of units in the shift register determines the value of m.
Many of you may not feel comfortable solving systems of equation. You can apply the following brute force method:
Check, all possible sets of values of K1, K2 and K3 listed in the following table to find out which set satisfies all the above equations (i.e., makes both sides of the equations equal) :
| K1 | K2 | K3 |
| 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 1 | 1 | 0 |
| 1 | 1 | 1 |
2.An organization uses same stream cipher key multiple times. An attacker who knows that, captures two ciphertexts C1 and C2 and finds that,
C1⊕C2= 0000101000011101000000110001001100010000000101000000011000000011000010100000100100011011
The attacker also knows that the plaintexts are composed of only English capital letters without any punctuations or space, and that one of the plaintexts contains the word: “PRESIDENT”. He was able to recover both the plaintexts. Show, how. (Points 25)
Hints: Slide ASCII for “PRESIDENT” over C1⊕C2 and XOR them. You can start from the left and keep sliding right, or start from the right and keep sliding left until you find a meaningful 9 letter phrase (since PRESIDENT is a 9 letter word). Once you retrieve the partial plaintexts, use your intuition and linguistic observations to complete the rest as much as possible.
3.Write brief notes on the following: (Points 10+10)
RC4 Cipher: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RC4
Transposition Cipher: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transposition_cipher
By submitting this paper, you agree: (1) that you are submitting your paper to be used and stored as part of the SafeAssign™ services in accordance with the Blackboard Privacy Policy; (2) that your institution may use your paper in accordance with your institution’s policies; and (3) that your use of SafeAssign will be without recourse against Blackboard Inc. and its affiliates.
