Birla Institute of Technology & Science – Pilani

Hyderabad Campus
nd
2 Semester 2020-2021
Cryptography (BITS F463) – Mid Sem Test (Regular)
Date: 02.03.2021 Weightage: 35% Duration: 1 hr 30 min. Type: Open Book
Q1. (a) Given the text DLFDSDNDIHBDDTNTUEBLUOIMCVBSERULYO and the keyword
in its numeric equivalence (6 0 11 14 8 18) find out the original message by applying the
standard 5 x 5 key matrix cipher and its rules. Write all the steps clearly.

(b) Given the cipher text S L H Z Y A T G Z T and let K = 2 1 be the matrix used for a Hill
cipher encryption. 3 4

Represent the given text as 2 x 1 vectors and find out as to what did the sender send as the
original message? You have to write all the steps to get full marks.

(c) Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability (CIA) are called the three pillars of computer
security. Consider an organizational setup comprising 150 employees. This organization is very
keen that all its employees maintain confidentiality while they communicate with each other. The
objective is to ensure that others cannot decode the communication between two persons in the
group. Find out the number of keys required to ensure confidentiality. Show the steps clearly.

(d) Assume that we are using the Vigenere keyword (21,4,2,19,14,17) and the recipient got the
message CITXWJCSYBHNJVML. Find out the message conveyed to the recipient by the
sender.

(e) We have studied about both the additive as well as the multiplicative ciphers. Consider a
cipher system whereby we choose a multiplicative number a and and additive number b. Let p be
a plaintext number. Let us define the transformation as C = (ap + b) mod 26. Let a = 239 and b =
152. As you know, this is summer season and the sender wants to tell the receiver to “drink
water”, what would be the message received at the other end encrypted using this cipher system?
(15 marks)
Q2. (a) A user of a cryptographically secured system received a message GPSDOAILTIVRVAA
WETECNITHMEDLHETALEAONME. By looking at the text message, he suspects that
probably columnar transposition was applied and that the key is 7. What is the plain text
message? Use the letter x as a filler wherever required. Show all the steps clearly.
(b) Consider the columnar transposition technique. If the text after encryption was
TKODEGUWMRYINPTDCFEHOQOUEZHBXOLERJVA with the matrix of size 6 rows (5
full and the last partial with only one letter) and 7 columns, find the plain text as well as the
keyword/key.
(c) Given a plaintext message in the form of three linearly independent vectors of 3 letters each
as m1, m2 and m3, where m1 = {1, 17, 4}, m2 = {0, 19, 7} and m3 = {19, 0, 10}. Given the key
matrix as:
Treat the plain text and the cipher text vectors as aligned column-wise and find the ciphertext as
applied to the Hill cipher mechanism.
(15 marks)
Q3. Consider the Data Encryption Standard. We are aware that DES uses plaintext of size 64
bits, key size of 56 bits and 16 rounds. But the user Jack - though he is convinced of the strength
of DES - feels that it is time consuming to go with such an extensive block cipher. Instead, he
decides to customize DES to meet his requirements. So, he devises the following scheme.

 Plaintext size = 8 bits; no. of rounds = 4;

 assumes no initial permutation.
 fi(x) is (i . x)K mod 16 where (i = 1, . . . , 4)
// equivalent of the round function in DES

(i) Given K = 1101 and the encrypted string as 10100101, find out L0 and R0. (ii) Also, after
finding L0 and R0, draw the structure to show the flow of the encryption process (similar to the
Feistel cipher structure for DES). Show all the stages clearly.
(10 marks)
Q4. As we are aware, Caesar cipher is one of the most basic classical ciphers. A user named Jill,
however, is very keen to use this cipher – albeit with some modifications. She comes up with
some tweaking of the Caesar cipher whereby, she performs additional shifts at specified
locations for the entire the plain text. She designs a function, which takes the plaintext and a list
of tuple shifts. That is, a tuple shift of (0, 2) means that the shift starts are position 0 in the plain
text and is a Caesar shift of 2. There are layered shifts as well. For example, a layered set of
shifts [(0, 2), (5, 3)] will first apply a Caesar shift of 2 to the entire string followed by Caesar
shift of 3 starting at the 6th letter in the string.
Now, Jill generated a cipher text message JufYkaolfapxQdrnzmasmRyrpfdvpmEurrb using a set
of layered shifts [(0, 6), (3, 18), (12, 16)]. What is the original plain text message, which Jill has
encrypted? It is mandatory to show all the steps clearly.
(10 marks)

Q5. (a) Substitution boxes or S-boxes are integral to Data Encryption Standard. Find out the
outcomes of the following transformations.
(i) S1(100001) (ii) S2(011110) (iii) S3(101010) (iv) S4(011100) (v) S5(111110) using the
standard S-boxes.
(b) You are aware of how the expansion table (E-table) is useful in DES in expanding a 32 bit
value to a 48 bit value to be later used by the F-function. Let us say, I have a very long message
and part of the input word is efghijklmnop. Assume that this input word is fed as input to the E-
table, what will be the output after applying expansion?
(10 marks)

Q6. (a) (i) Show that an ideal block cipher with n = 4 is essentially nothing but a Hill cipher with
m = 4. Here n, m are standard notations discussed in the class. Substantiate your answer and
show all the steps clealy. (ii) Also give reason for the fact that the ideal block cipher is not a
practical possibility.
(b) DES uses an Initial Permutation (IP) and a Permutation (P) operation during encryption.
Though they both are permutation operations, they are different. Tabulate the five differences
between IP and P. Please write your answers in a crisp way. Reason your answer.
(10 marks)