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(Strong) circular external difference families (which we denote as CEDFs and SCEDFs) can be used to construct nonmalleable threshold schemes. They are a variation of (strong) external difference families, which have been extensively studied in recent years. We provide a variety of constructions for CEDFs based on graceful labellings ($\alpha$-valuations) of lexicographic products $C_n \boldsymbol{\cdot} K_{\ell}^c$, where $C_n$ denotes a cycle of length $n$. SCEDFs having more than two subsets do not exist. However, we can construct close approximations (more specifically, certain types of circular algebraic manipulation detection (AMD) codes) using the theory of cyclotomic numbers in finite fields.

Various notions of non-malleable secret sharing schemes have been considered. In this paper, we review the existing work on non-malleable secret sharing and suggest a novel game-based definition. We provide a new construction of an unconditionally secure non-malleable threshold scheme with respect to a specified relation. To do so, we introduce a new type of algebraic manipulation detection (AMD) code and construct examples of new variations of external difference families, which are of independent combinatorial interest.

In this paper, we initiate a study of asymmetric all-or-nothing transforms (or asymmetric AONTs). A (symmetric) $t$-all-or-nothing transform is a bijective mapping defined on the set of $s$-tuples over a specified finite alphabet. It is required that knowledge of all but $t$ outputs leaves any $t$ inputs completely undetermined. There have been numerous papers developing the theory of AONTs as well as presenting various applications of AONTs in cryptography and information security. In this paper, we replace the parameter $t$ by two parameters $t_o$ and $t_i$, where $t_i \leq t_o$. The requirement is that knowledge of all but $t_o$ outputs leaves any $t_i$ inputs completely undetermined. When $t_i < t_o$, we refer to the AONT as asymmetric. We give several constructions and bounds for various classes of asymmetric AONTs, especially those with $t_i = 1$ or $t_i = 2$. We pay particular attention to linear transforms, where the alphabet is a finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$ and the mapping is linear.

A splitting BIBD is a type of combinatorial design that can be used to construct splitting authentication codes with good properties. In this paper we show that a design-theoretic approach is useful in the analysis of more general splitting authentication codes. Motivated by the study of algebraic manipulation detection (AMD) codes, we define the concept of a group generated splitting authentication code. We show that all group-generated authentication codes have perfect secrecy, which allows us to demonstrate that algebraic manipulation detection codes can be considered to be a special case of an authentication code with perfect secrecy. We also investigate splitting BIBDs that can be "equitably ordered". These splitting BIBDs yield authentication codes with splitting that also have perfect secrecy. We show that, while group generated BIBDs are inherently equitably ordered, the concept is applicable to more general splitting BIBDs. For various pairs $(k,c)$, we determine necessary and sufficient (or almost sufficient) conditions for the existence of $(v, k \times c,1)$-splitting BIBDs that can be equitably ordered. The pairs for which we can solve this problem are $(k,c) = (3,2), (4,2), (3,3)$ and $(3,4)$, as well as all cases with $k = 2$.

In this paper, we show a "direct" equivalence between certain authentication codes and robust secret sharing schemes. It was previously known that authentication codes and robust secret sharing schemes are closely related to similar types of designs, but direct equivalences had not been considered in the literature. Our new equivalences motivate the consideration of a certain "key-substitution attack." We study this attack and analyze it in the setting of "dual authentication codes." We also show how this viewpoint provides a nice way to prove properties and generalizations of some known constructions.

A repairable threshold scheme (which we abbreviate to RTS) is a $(\tau,n)$-threshold scheme in which a subset of players can "repair" another player's share in the event that their share has been lost or corrupted. This will take place without the participation of the dealer who set up the scheme. The repairing protocol should not compromise the (unconditional) security of the threshold scheme. Combinatorial repairable threshold schemes (or combinatorial RTS) were recently introduced by Stinson and Wei. In these schemes, "multiple shares" are distributed to each player, as defined by a suitable combinatorial design called the distribution design. In this paper, we study the reliability of these combinatorial repairable threshold schemes in a setting where players may not be available to take part in a repair of a given player's share. Using techniques from network reliability theory, we consider the probability of existence of an available repair set, as well as the expected number of available repair sets, for various types of distribution designs.

The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyze the Cayley-Purser algorithm, which is a public-key cryptosystem proposed by Flannery in 1999. I will present two attacks on it, one of which is apparently new. I will also examine a variant of the Cayley-Purser algorithm that was patented by Slavin in 2008, and show that it is also insecure., Comment: submitted for publication

In 1996, Jackson and Martin proved that a strong ideal ramp scheme is equivalent to an orthogonal array. However, there was no good characterization of ideal ramp schemes that are not strong. Here we show the equivalence of ideal ramp schemes to a new variant of orthogonal arrays that we term augmented orthogonal arrays. We give some constructions for these new kinds of arrays, and, as a consequence, we also provide parameter situations where ideal ramp schemes exist but strong ideal ramp schemes do not exist.

A $(t, s, v)$-all-or-nothing transform is a bijective mapping defined on $s$-tuples over an alphabet of size $v$, which satisfies the condition that the values of any $t$ input co-ordinates are completely undetermined, given only the values of any $s-t$ output co-ordinates. The main question we address in this paper is: for which choices of parameters does a $(t, s, v)$-all-or-nothing transform (AONT) exist? More specifically, if we fix $t$ and $v$, we want to determine the maximum integer $s$ such that a $(t, s, v)$-AONT exists. We mainly concentrate on the case $t=2$ for arbitrary values of $v$, where we obtain various necessary as well as sufficient conditions for existence of these objects. We consider both linear and general (linear or nonlinear) AONT. We also show some connections between AONT, orthogonal arrays and resilient functions., Comment: 13 pages

In this paper, we consider methods whereby a subset of players in a $(k,n)$-threshold scheme can "repair" another player's share in the event that their share has been lost or corrupted. This will take place without the participation of the dealer who set up the scheme. The repairing protocol should not compromise the (unconditional) security of the threshold scheme, and it should be efficient, where efficiency is measured in terms of the amount of information exchanged during the repairing process. We study two approaches to repairing. The first method is based on the "enrollment protocol" from \cite{NSG} which was originally developed to add a new player to a threshold scheme (without the participation of the dealer) after the scheme was set up. The second method distributes "multiple shares" to each player, as defined by a suitable combinatorial design. This method results in larger shares, but lower communication complexity, as compared to the first method.

There has been considerable recent interest in "cloud storage" wherein a user asks a server to store a large file. One issue is whether the user can verify that the server is actually storing the file, and typically a challenge-response protocol is employed to convince the user that the file is indeed being stored correctly. The security of these schemes is phrased in terms of an extractor which will recover the file given any "proving algorithm" that has a sufficiently high success probability. This forms the basis of \emph{proof-of-retrievability} ($\mathsf{PoR}$) systems. In this paper, we study multiple server $\mathsf{PoR}$ systems. We formalize security definitions for two possible scenarios: (i) when a threshold of servers succeed with high enough probability (worst-case) and (ii) when the average of the success probability of all the servers is above a threshold (average-case). We also motivate the study of confidentiality of the outsourced message. We give $\mathsf{M}\mbox{-}\mathsf{PoR}$ schemes which are secure under both these security definitions and provide reasonable confidentiality guarantees even when there is no restriction on the computational power of the servers. We also show how classical statistical techniques used by Paterson, Stinson and Upadhyay (Journal of Mathematical Cryptology: 7(3)) can be extended to evaluate whether the responses of the provers are accurate enough to permit successful extraction. We also look at one specific instantiation of our construction when instantiated with the unconditionally secure version of the Shacham-Waters scheme (Asiacrypt, 2008). This scheme gives reasonable security and privacy guarantee. We show that, in the multi-server setting with computationally unbounded provers, one can overcome the limitation that the verifier needs to store as much secret information as the provers., Comment: 22 pages

We continue a study of unconditionally secure all-or-nothing transforms (AONT) begun in \cite{St}. An AONT is a bijective mapping that constructs s outputs from s inputs. We consider the security of t inputs, when s-t outputs are known. Previous work concerned the case t=1; here we consider the problem for general t, focussing on the case t=2. We investigate constructions of binary matrices for which the desired properties hold with the maximum probability. Upper bounds on these probabilities are obtained via a quadratic programming approach, while lower bounds can be obtained from combinatorial constructions based on symmetric BIBDs and cyclotomy. We also report some results on exhaustive searches and random constructions for small values of s., Comment: 23 pages

This paper provides a mathematical analysis of optimal algebraic manipulation detection (AMD) codes. We prove several lower bounds on the success probability of an adversary and we then give some combinatorial characterizations of AMD codes that meet the bounds with equality. These characterizations involve various types of generalized difference families. Constructing these difference families is an interesting problem in its own right.

We study a method for key predistribution in a network of $n$ users where pairwise keys are computed by hashing users' IDs along with secret information that has been (pre)distributed to the network users by a trusted entity. A communication graph $G$ can be specified to indicate which pairs of users should be able to compute keys. We determine necessary and sufficient conditions for schemes of this type to be secure. We also consider the problem of minimizing the storage requirements of such a scheme; we are interested in the total storage as well as the maximum storage required by any user. Minimizing the total storage is NP-hard, whereas minimizing the maximum storage required by a user can be computed in polynomial time.

In the generalized Russian cards problem, we have a card deck $X$ of $n$ cards and three participants, Alice, Bob, and Cathy, dealt $a$, $b$, and $c$ cards, respectively. Once the cards are dealt, Alice and Bob wish to privately communicate their hands to each other via public announcements, without the advantage of a shared secret or public key infrastructure. Cathy should remain ignorant of all but her own cards after Alice and Bob have made their announcements. Notions for Cathy's ignorance in the literature range from Cathy not learning the fate of any individual card with certainty (weak $1$-security) to not gaining any probabilistic advantage in guessing the fate of some set of $\delta$ cards (perfect $\delta$-security). As we demonstrate, the generalized Russian cards problem has close ties to the field of combinatorial designs, on which we rely heavily, particularly for perfect security notions. Our main result establishes an equivalence between perfectly $\delta$-secure strategies and $(c+\delta)$-designs on $n$ points with block size $a$, when announcements are chosen uniformly at random from the set of possible announcements. We also provide construction methods and example solutions, including a construction that yields perfect $1$-security against Cathy when $c=2$. We leverage a known combinatorial design to construct a strategy with $a=8$, $b=13$, and $c=3$ that is perfectly $2$-secure. Finally, we consider a variant of the problem that yields solutions that are easy to construct and optimal with respect to both the number of announcements and level of security achieved. Moreover, this is the first method obtaining weak $\delta$-security that allows Alice to hold an arbitrary number of cards and Cathy to hold a set of $c = \lfloor \frac{a-\delta}{2} \rfloor$ cards. Alternatively, the construction yields solutions for arbitrary $\delta$, $c$ and any $a \geq \delta + 2c$.

There has been considerable recent interest in "cloud storage" wherein a user asks a server to store a large file. One issue is whether the user can verify that the server is actually storing the file, and typically a challenge-response protocol is employed to convince the user that the file is indeed being stored correctly. The security of these schemes is phrased in terms of an extractor which will recover or retrieve the file given any "proving algorithm" that has a sufficiently high success probability. This paper treats proof-of-retrievability schemes in the model of unconditional security, where an adversary has unlimited computational power. In this case retrievability of the file can be modelled as error-correction in a certain code. We provide a general analytical framework for such schemes that yields exact (non-asymptotic) reductions that precisely quantify conditions for extraction to succeed as a function of the success probability of a proving algorithm, and we apply this analysis to several archetypal schemes. In addition, we provide a new methodology for the analysis of keyed POR schemes in an unconditionally secure setting, and use it to prove the security of a modified version of a scheme due to Shacham and Waters under a slightly restricted attack model, thus providing the first example of a keyed POR scheme with unconditional security. We also show how classical statistical techniques can be used to evaluate whether the responses of the prover are accurate enough to permit successful extraction. Finally, we prove a new lower bound on storage and communication complexity of POR schemes.

We present the first formal mathematical presentation of the generalized Russian cards problem, and provide rigorous security definitions that capture both basic and extended versions of weak and perfect security notions. In the generalized Russian cards problem, three players, Alice, Bob, and Cathy, are dealt a deck of $n$ cards, each given $a$, $b$, and $c$ cards, respectively. The goal is for Alice and Bob to learn each other's hands via public communication, without Cathy learning the fate of any particular card. The basic idea is that Alice announces a set of possible hands she might hold, and Bob, using knowledge of his own hand, should be able to learn Alice's cards from this announcement, but Cathy should not. Using a combinatorial approach, we are able to give a nice characterization of informative strategies (i.e., strategies allowing Bob to learn Alice's hand), having optimal communication complexity, namely the set of possible hands Alice announces must be equivalent to a large set of $t-(n, a, 1)$-designs, where $t=a-c$. We also provide some interesting necessary conditions for certain types of deals to be simultaneously informative and secure. That is, for deals satisfying $c = a-d$ for some $d \geq 2$, where $b \geq d-1$ and the strategy is assumed to satisfy a strong version of security (namely perfect $(d-1)$-security), we show that $a = d+1$ and hence $c=1$. We also give a precise characterization of informative and perfectly $(d-1)$-secure deals of the form $(d+1, b, 1)$ satisfying $b \geq d-1$ involving $d-(n, d+1, 1)$-designs.

We consider user-private information retrieval (UPIR), an interesting alternative to private information retrieval (PIR) introduced by Domingo-Ferrer et al. In UPIR, the database knows which records have been retrieved, but does not know the identity of the query issuer. The goal of UPIR is to disguise user profiles from the database. Domingo-Ferrer et al.\ focus on using a peer-to-peer community to construct a UPIR scheme, which we term P2P UPIR. In this paper, we establish a strengthened model for P2P UPIR and clarify the privacy goals of such schemes using standard terminology from the field of privacy research. In particular, we argue that any solution providing privacy against the database should attempt to minimize any corresponding loss of privacy against other users. We give an analysis of existing schemes, including a new attack by the database. Finally, we introduce and analyze two new protocols. Whereas previous work focuses on a special type of combinatorial design known as a configuration, our protocols make use of more general designs. This allows for flexibility in protocol set-up, allowing for a choice between having a dynamic scheme (in which users are permitted to enter and leave the system), or providing increased privacy against other users., Comment: Updated version, which reflects reviewer comments and includes expanded explanations throughout. Paper is accepted for publication by Advances in Mathematics of Communications