Unit 5

Chapter 13 – Digital Signatures

To guard against the baneful influence exerted by strangers is

therefore an elementary dictate of savage prudence. Hence
before strangers are allowed to enter a district, or at least
before they are permitted to mingle freely with the inhabitants,
certain ceremonies are often performed by the natives of the
country for the purpose of disarming the strangers of their
magical powers, or of disinfecting, so to speak, the tainted
atmosphere by which they are supposed to be surrounded.
—The Golden Bough, Sir James George Frazer
 Digital Signatures

• have looked at message authentication

– but does not address issues of lack of trust
• digital signatures provide the ability to:
– verify author, date & time of signature
– authenticate message contents
– be verified by third parties to resolve disputes
• hence include authentication function with additional capabilities
 Examples

• A person signs a document to show that it originated from her

or was approved by her. The signature is proof to the
recipient that the document comes from the correct entity.
• When a customer signs a check, the bank needs to be sure
that the check is issued by that customer and nobody else. In
other words, a signature on a document, when verified, is a
sign of authentication -- the document is authentic.
• Consider a painting signed by an artist. The signature on the
art, if authentic, means that the painting is probably
authentic.
Digital Signature Model
Digital Signature
Model
Conventional Signatures and Digital Signatures

• Inclusion
• A conventional signature is included in the document; it is part of the
document.
• When we write a check, the signature is on the check; it is not a
separate document.
• But when we sign a document digitally, we send the signature as a
separate document.
– The sender sends two documents: the message and the signature. The recipient
receives both documents and verifies that the signature belongs to the supposed
sender. If this is proven, the message is kept; otherwise, it is rejected.
Conventional Signatures and Digital Signatures

• Verification Method
• For a conventional signature, when the recipient receives a document,
she compares the signature on the document with the signature on file.
If they are the same, the document is authentic.
– The recipient needs to have a copy of this signature on file for comparison.
• For a digital signature, the recipient receives the message and the
signature. A copy of the signature is not stored anywhere.
– The recipient needs to apply a verification technique to the combination of the
message and the signature to verify the authenticity.
Conventional Signatures and Digital Signatures

• Relationship
• For a conventional signature, there is normally a one-to-many
relationship between a signature and documents.
– A person uses the same signature to sign many documents.
• For a digital signature, there is a one-to-one relationship between a
signature and a message. Each message has its own signature.
– The signature of one message cannot be used in another message.
• If Bob receives two messages, one after another, from Alice, he cannot
use the signature of the first message to verify the second. Each
message needs a new signature.
Conventional Signatures and Digital Signatures

• Duplicity
• In conventional signature, a copy of the signed document can be
distinguished from the original one on file.
• In digital signature, there is no such distinction unless there is a factor of
time (such as a timestamp) on the document.
– For example, suppose Alice sends a document instructing Bob to pay Eve. If Eve
intercepts the document and the signature, she can replay it later to get money
again from Bob.
 Process

• The sender uses a signing algorithm to sign the message.

• The message and the signature are sent to the receiver.
• The receiver receives the message and the signature and
applies the verifying algorithm to the combination.
• If the result is true, the message is accepted; otherwise, it is
rejected.
Digital Signature Process
Adding key to the Digital Signature Process

Can we use a secret (symmetric) key to both

sign and verify a signature?
 Adding key to the Digital Signature Process

First, a secret key is known by only two entities (Alice and Bob, for example). So if
Alice needs to sign another document and send it to Ted, she needs to use another
secret key.
Second, as we will see, creating a secret key for a session involves authentication,
which uses a digital signature.
Third, Bob could use the secret key between himself and Alice, sign a document,
send it to Ted, and pretend that it came from Alice.
 Note

• A digital signature needs a public-key system.

• The signer signs with her private key; the verifier verifies
with the signer’s public key.
 Note

• A cryptosystem uses the private and public keys of the

receiver: a digital signature uses the private and public
keys of the sender.
 Attacks and Forgeries

• attacks
– key-only attack
– known message attack
– generic chosen message attack
– directed chosen message attack
– adaptive chosen message attack
• break success levels
– total break
– selective forgery
– existential forgery
 Digital Signature Requirements

must depend on the message signed

must use information unique to sender
to prevent both forgery and denial
must be relatively easy to produce
must be relatively easy to recognize & verify
be computationally infeasible to forge
with new message for existing digital signature
with fraudulent digital signature for given message
be practical save digital signature in storage
 Direct Digital Signatures

• involve only sender & receiver

• assumed receiver has sender’s public-key
• digital signature made by sender signing entire message or hash with
private-key
• can encrypt using receivers public-key
• important that sign first then encrypt message & signature
• security depends on sender’s private-key
 ElGamal Digital Signatures

• signature variant of ElGamal, related to D-H

– so uses exponentiation in a finite (Galois)
– with security based difficulty of computing discrete logarithms, as in D-H
• use private key for encryption (signing)
• uses public key for decryption (verification)
• each user (eg. A) generates their key
– chooses a secret key (number): 1 < xA < q-1
– compute their public key: yA = axA mod q
 ElGamal Digital Signature

• Alice signs a message M to Bob by computing

– the hash m = H(M), 0 <= m <= (q-1)
– chose random integer K with 1 <= K <= (q-1) and
gcd(K,q-1)=1
– compute temporary key: S1 = ak mod q
– compute K-1 the inverse of K mod (q-1)
– compute the value: S2 = K-1(m-xAS1) mod (q-1)
– signature is:(S1,S2)
• any user B can verify the signature by computing
– V1 = am mod q
– V2 = yAS1 S1S2 mod q
– signature is valid if V1 = V2
 ElGamal Signature Example

• use field GF(19) q=19 and a=10

• Alice computes her key:
– A chooses xA=16 & computes yA=1016 mod 19 = 4
• Alice signs message with hash m=14 as (3,4):
– choosing random K=5 which has gcd(18,5)=1
– computing S1 = 105 mod 19 = 3
– finding K-1 mod (q-1) = 5-1 mod 18 = 11
– computing S2 = 11(14-16.3) mod 18 = 4
• any user B can verify the signature by computing
– V1 = 1014 mod 19 = 16
– V2 = 43.34 = 5184 = 16 mod 19
– since 16 = 16 signature is valid
 Schnorr Digital Signatures

• also uses exponentiation in a finite (Galois)

– security based on discrete logarithms, as in D-H
• minimizes message dependent computation
– multiplying a 2n-bit integer with an n-bit integer
• main work can be done in idle time
• have using a prime modulus p
– p–1 has a prime factor q of appropriate size
– typically p 1024-bit and q 160-bit numbers
 Schnorr Key Setup

• choose suitable primes p , q

q
• choose a such that a = 1 mod p
• (a,p,q) are global parameters for all
• each user (eg. A) generates a key
– chooses a secret key (number): 0 < sA < q
– compute their public key: vA = a-sA mod q
 Schnorr Signature

• user signs message by

– choosing random r with 0<r<q and computing x = ar mod p
– concatenate message with x and hash result to computing: e = H(M || x)
– computing: y = (r + se) mod q
– signature is pair (e, y)

• any other user can verify the signature as follows:

– computing: x' = ayve mod p
– verifying that: e = H(M || x’)
 Digital Signature Standard (DSS)
• US Govt approved signature scheme
• designed by NIST & NSA in early 90's
• published as FIPS-186 in 1991
• revised in 1993, 1996 & then 2000
• uses the SHA hash algorithm
• DSS is the standard, DSA is the algorithm
• FIPS 186-2 (2000) includes alternative RSA & elliptic
curve signature variants
• DSA is digital signature only unlike RSA
• is a public-key technique
DSS vs RSA Signatures
 Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA)

 creates a 320 bit signature

 with 512-1024 bit security
 smaller and faster than RSA
 a digital signature scheme only
 security depends on difficulty of computing discrete logarithms
 variant of ElGamal & Schnorr schemes
 DSA Key Generation

• have shared global public key values (p,q,g):

– choose 160-bit prime number q
– choose a large prime p with 2L-1 < p < 2L
• where L= 512 to 1024 bits and is a multiple of 64
• such that q is a 160 bit prime divisor of (p-1)
– choose g = h(p-1)/q
• where 1<h<p-1 and h(p-1)/q mod p > 1
• users choose private & compute public key:
– choose random private key: x<q
– compute public key: y = gx mod p
 DSA Signature Creation

 to sign a message M the sender:

 generates a random signature key k, k<q
 nb. k must be random, be destroyed after use, and never be reused
 then computes signature pair:
r = (gk mod p)mod q
s = [k-1(H(M)+ xr)] mod q
 sends signature (r,s) with message M
 DSA Signature Verification

• having received M & signature (r,s)

• to verify a signature, recipient computes:
w = s-1 mod q
u1= [H(M)w ]mod q
u2= (rw)mod q
v = [(gu1 yu2)mod p ]mod q
• if v=r then signature is verified
• see Appendix A for details of proof why
DSS Overview
 Summary

• have discussed:
– digital signatures
– ElGamal & Schnorr signature schemes
– digital signature algorithm and standard