Cryptography and Network

Security
Third Edition
by William Stallings

Lecture slides by Lawrie Brown

 Chapter 12 – Hash Algorithms

Each of the messages, like each one he had ever

read of Stern's commands, began with a number
and ended with a number or row of numbers. No
efforts on the part of Mungo or any of his experts
had been able to break Stern's code, nor was
there any clue as to what the preliminary number
and those ultimate numbers signified.
—Talking to Strange Men, Ruth Rendell
 Hash Algorithms
• see similarities in the evolution of hash
functions & block ciphers
– increasing power of brute-force attacks
– leading to evolution in algorithms
– from DES to AES in block ciphers
– from MD4 & MD5 to SHA-1 & RIPEMD-160 in
hash algorithms
• likewise tend to use common iterative
structure as do block ciphers
 MD5
• designed by Ronald Rivest (the R in RSA)
• latest in a series of MD2, MD4
• produces a 128-bit hash value
• until recently was the most widely used
hash algorithm
– in recent times have both brute-force &
cryptanalytic concerns
• specified as Internet standard RFC1321
 MD5 Overview
1. pad message so its length is 448 mod 512
• Padding of 1-512 bits is always used.
• Padding: 1000….0
2. append a 64-bit length value to message
• Generate a message with 512L bits in length
3. initialise 4-word (128-bit) MD buffer (A,B,C,D)
4. process message in 16-word (512-bit) blocks:
5. output hash value is the final buffer value
MD5 Overview
MD5 Compression Function
 MD5 Compression Function
• each round has 16 steps of the form:
a = b+((a+g(b,c,d)+X[k]+T[i])<<<s)
• a,b,c,d refer to the 4 words of the buffer, but
used in varying permutations
– note this updates 1 word only of the buffer
– after 16 steps each word is updated 4 times
• where g(b,c,d) is a different nonlinear function in
each round (F,G,H,I)
• T[i] is a constant value derived from sin
• The point of all this complexity:
– To make it difficult to generate collisions
 Strength of MD5
• Every hash bit is dependent on all message bits
• Rivest conjectures security is as good as possible for a
128 bit hash
– Given a hash, find a message: O(2128) operations
– No disproof exists yet
• known attacks are:
– Berson 92 attacked any 1 round using differential cryptanalysis
(but can’t extend)
– Boer & Bosselaers 93 found a pseudo collision (again unable to
extend)
– Dobbertin 96 created collisions on MD compression function for
one block, cannot expand to many blocks
– Brute-force search now considered possible
Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA-1)
• SHA was designed by NIST & NSA in 1993,
revised 1995 as SHA-1
• US standard for use with DSA signature scheme
– standard is FIPS 180-1 1995, also Internet RFC3174
– nb. the algorithm is SHA, the standard is SHS
• produces 160-bit hash values
• now the generally preferred hash algorithm
• based on design of MD4 with key differences
 SHA Overview
1. pad message so its length is 448 mod 512
2. append a 64-bit length value to message
3. initialise 5-word (160-bit) buffer (A,B,C,D,E) to
(67452301,efcdab89,98badcfe,10325476,c3d2e1f0)
4. process message in 16-word (512-bit) chunks:
– expand 16 words into 80 words by mixing & shifting
– use 4 rounds of 20 bit operations on message block
& buffer
– add output to input to form new buffer value
5. output hash value is the final buffer value
SHA-1 Compression Function
Logical functions for SHA-1
 SHA-1 Compression Function
• each round has 20 steps which replaces
the 5 buffer words thus:
(A,B,C,D,E) <-(E+f(t,B,C,D)+(A<<5)+Wt+Kt),A,
(B<<30),C,D)
• ABCDE refer to the 5 words of the buffer
• t is the step number
• f(t,B,C,D) is nonlinear function for round
• Wt is derived from the message block
• Kt is a constant value (P359)
 Creation of 80-word input
• Adds redundancy and interdependence among
message blocks
 SHA-1 verses MD5
• brute force attack is harder (160 vs 128
bits for MD5)
• not vulnerable to any known attacks
(compared to MD4/5)
• a little slower than MD5 (80 vs 64 steps)
• both designed as simple and compact
• optimised for big endian CPU's (SUN) vs
MD5 for little endian CPU’s (PC)
Revised Secure Hash Standard
• NIST have issued a revision FIPS 180-2
• adds 3 additional hash algorithms
• SHA-256, SHA-384, SHA-512
– Different lengths of hash bits
• designed for compatibility with increased
security provided by the AES cipher
• structure & detail is similar to SHA-1
 RIPEMD-160
• RIPEMD-160 was developed in Europe as part
of RIPE project in 96
• by researchers involved in attacks on MD4/5
• initial proposal strengthen following analysis to
become RIPEMD-160
• somewhat similar to MD5/SHA
• uses 2 parallel lines of 5 rounds of 16 steps
• creates a 160-bit hash value
• slower, but probably more secure, than SHA
 RIPEMD-160 Overview
1. pad message so its length is 448 mod 512
2. append a 64-bit length value to message
3. initialise 5-word (160-bit) buffer (A,B,C,D,E) to
(67452301,efcdab89,98badcfe,10325476,c3d2e1f0)
4. process message in 16-word (512-bit) chunks:
– use 10 rounds of 16 bit operations on message
block & buffer – in 2 parallel lines of 5
– add output to input to form new buffer value
5. output hash value is the final buffer value
RIPEMD-160 Round
RIPEMD-160 Compression
Function
 RIPEMD-160 Design Criteria
• use 2 parallel lines of 5 rounds for
increased complexity
• for simplicity the 2 lines are very similar
– Different Ks
– Different order of fs
– Different ordering of Xi
• step operation very close to MD5
– Rotate C by 10 bit to avoid a known MD5
attack
 RIPEMD-160 Design Criteria
• permutation varies parts of message used
– Two words close in one round are far apart in the next
– Two words close in the left line will be at least 7
positions apart in the right line
• circular shifts designed for best results
– Shifts larger than 5 (<5 is considered weak)
– Different amount for the five rounds
– Total shifts for each word in five rounds not divisible
by 32
– Not too many shift constants should be divisible by 4
RIPEMD-160 verses MD5 & SHA-1
• brute force attack harder (160 like SHA-1 vs 128
bits for MD5)
• not vulnerable to known attacks to MD4/5
– Double lines considered more secure than SHA-1
– Still little is know for the design principles for them
• slower than MD5 (more steps)
• all designed as simple and compact
• SHA-1 optimised for big endian CPU's vs
RIPEMD-160 & MD5 optimised for little endian
CPU’s
 What is more secure?
• Longer messages lead to more collision
per hash value
– Is it more secure to use shorter messages?
– Need to consider the scenarios
• Known message, find out a collision message
• Find out a collision pair using birthday attack
• Uniform distribution assumption
 Keyed Hash Functions as MACs
• have desire to create a MAC using a hash
function rather than a block cipher
– because hash functions are generally faster
– not limited by export controls unlike block
ciphers
• hash includes a key along with the
message
• led to development of HMAC
 HMAC Requirements
• Blackbox use of hash without modification
• Not much overhead than original hash
• Easy to replace the hash module
– Easy to upgrade security
HMAC Overview
 HMAC
• specified as Internet standard RFC2104
• uses hash function on the message:
HMACK = Hash[(K+ XOR opad) ||
Hash[(K+ XOR ipad)||M)]]
• where K+ is the key padded out to size
• and opad, ipad are specified padding constants
• overhead is just 3 more hash calculations than
the message needs alone
• any of MD5, SHA-1, RIPEMD-160 can be used
 Summary
• have considered:
– some current hash algorithms:
• MD5, SHA-1, RIPEMD-160
– HMAC authentication using a hash function