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International Conference on Information Security

ISC 2006: Information Security pp 46–59Cite as

Breaking Four Mix-Related Schemes Based on Universal Re-encryption

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 4176))

Abstract

Universal Re-encryption allows El-Gamal ciphertexts to be re-encrypted without knowledge of their corresponding public keys. This has made it an enticing building block for anonymous communications protocols. In this work we analyze four schemes related to mix networks that make use of Universal Re-encryption and find serious weaknesses in all of them. The Universal Re-encryption of signatures is open to existential forgery, and the two mix schemes can be fully compromised by an passive adversary observing a single message close to the sender. The fourth scheme, the rWonGoo anonymous channel, turns out to be less secure than the original Crowds scheme, on which it is based. Our attacks make extensive use of unintended ‘services’ provided by the network nodes acting as decryption and re-routing oracles. Finally, our attacks against rWonGoo demonstrate that anonymous channels are not automatically composable: using two of them in a careless manner makes the system more vulnerable to attack.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. K.U. Leuven, ESAT/COSIC, Kasteelpark Arenberg 10, B-3001, Leuven-Heverlee, Belgium

    George Danezis

Authors
  1. George Danezis
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of the Aegean, University Hill, 81100, Mytilene, Greece

    Sokratis K. Katsikas

  2. Department of Information and Communication Technologies, University of A Coruña, Spain

    Javier López

  3. MPI-SWS,  

    Michael Backes

  4. Department of Information and Communication Systems Engineering, University of the Aegean, Karlovassi, Samos, Greece

    Stefanos Gritzalis

  5. Interdisciplinary Institute for BroadBand Technology (IBBT), Belgium

    Bart Preneel

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© 2006 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Danezis, G. (2006). Breaking Four Mix-Related Schemes Based on Universal Re-encryption. In: Katsikas, S.K., López, J., Backes, M., Gritzalis, S., Preneel, B. (eds) Information Security. ISC 2006. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 4176. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/11836810_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/11836810_4

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-38341-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-38343-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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