QUESTION

Q1. Alice and Bob are using RSA public key cryptography to send and receive information. Alice is using the following key pair (Private key: 7 and Public key: 5) whereas Bob’s key pair is (Private key: 11 and Public key: 7). Find the ciphertext (C) for the following messages (3 marks).

i) Message (M) = 9. Alice is sending a secret message to BoB.

ii) Message (M) = 6. Bob is sending Alice his signature.

Q2. Consider the network of a university. The network includes a number of servers which store important and sensitive data (such as user IDs, passwords, and student’s academic records), a wired network which is partially connected to the Internet, and a wireless extension which facilitates data access to students/staff on campus with portable devices. To protect user’s accounts, password files in the servers should be encrypted. To ensure efficiency of the authentication procedures, RC4 has been used as for password encryption. Explain why RC4 was selected in this application rather than RSA or LFSR based ciphers (3 marks).

Q3. In 2014, a security bug in the OpenSSL cryptography library was disclosed which could be exploited to compromise the secret keys used to identify the service providers and to encrypt the traffic. What is the name of the bug? Identify the security flaw exploited by the bug. What need to be done to keep your computer safe from this bug (2 marks)?

Public Answer

CGKWS3 The First Answerer