ETI 2510 - NETWORK SECURITY AND CRYPTOGRAPHY

November 29, 2021

CAT 2

ANSWER ALL QUESTIONS 40 MARKS TIME: 1½ HOURS

a) What is the fundamental difference between symmetric and asymmetric encryption? (4 Marks)
b) How does public key infrastructure add value to an organization seeking to use cryptography to protect
information assets? (3 Marks)
c) What are digital signatures? With reference to a suitable example explain in detail how digital signatures
work and the security attributes achieved by their use. (4 Marks)
d) Suppose Alice and Bob wish to do Diffie-Hellman key exchange. Alice and Bob have agreed upon a
prime p = 13, and a generator g = 2. Alice has chosen her private exponent to be a = 5, while Bob has
chosen his private exponent to be b = 4.
i) Show the intermediate quantities that both Alice and Bob calculate, as well as the final (shared)
secret that Diffie-Hellman produces. (4 Marks)
ii) Unknown to Alice and Bob, Eve is listening and is able to intercept their messages as well as
inject her own messages. Suppose Eve chooses an exponent e = 7. Explain how Eve can use e to
perform the Intruder-in-the-Middle attack on the Alice-Bob Diffie-Hellman key exchange.
(5 Marks)
e) Alice wishes to sign a document and send it to Bob using RSA signatures. Suppose she generates two
primes p = 7, q = 11, and a public exponent eA = 43, and publishes (n, eA) as her public key. (6 Marks)
i) What would her private key be?
ii) Suppose Alice has a message m = 3. Explain how she can use RSA to sign m and find the
corresponding signature for m = 3.
f) Explain the term salt in the context of cryptography and elaborate how they make passwords more
difficult to break. (3 Marks)
g) Alice and Bob use Caesar cipher for confidentiality and exchange messages in English. The following
ciphertext sent by Alice to Bob was intercepted by Mallory by tapping the insecure channel over which
the message was sent.

LXV NKXV-RUXK LRL MXF.

The substitution cipher used here substitutes only the letters of the alphabet. All nonletter characters,
such as space, punctuation marks and digits, are not changed. As the consulting cryptanalyst, decrypt
the ciphertext, clearly showing all steps of your working. (6 Marks)
Hint: Letter E has the highest usage frequency in the English language

h) The COVID-19 pandemic has introduced major paradigm shifts in how organizations manage typical
workdays. With reference to appropriate examples, discuss the role technology has played in facilitating
business continuity. Highlight the challenges encountered and countermeasures adopted in ensuring a
connected workforce. (5 Marks)

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