Keith M. Martin
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- December 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199695591
- eISBN:
- 9780191774898
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199695591.003.0007
- Subject:
- Mathematics, Applied Mathematics
This chapter examines digital signature schemes, the main cryptographic mechanisms for providing non-repudiation of data. It first looks at general requirements for a digital signature scheme. It ...
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This chapter examines digital signature schemes, the main cryptographic mechanisms for providing non-repudiation of data. It first looks at general requirements for a digital signature scheme. It then considers the ways in which a digital signature scheme could be realised. It discusses digital signature schemes based on RSA and digital signature schemes in practice.Less
This chapter examines digital signature schemes, the main cryptographic mechanisms for providing non-repudiation of data. It first looks at general requirements for a digital signature scheme. It then considers the ways in which a digital signature scheme could be realised. It discusses digital signature schemes based on RSA and digital signature schemes in practice.
Keith M. Martin
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- July 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198788003
- eISBN:
- 9780191829956
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198788003.003.0007
- Subject:
- Mathematics, Computational Mathematics / Optimization, Logic / Computer Science / Mathematical Philosophy
In this chapter, we discuss digital signature schemes. We start by considering the general requirements of a digital signature scheme. We show first that a digital signature scheme could be ...
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In this chapter, we discuss digital signature schemes. We start by considering the general requirements of a digital signature scheme. We show first that a digital signature scheme could be established using symmetric techniques. We then consider the more conventional use of public-key cryptography to create digital signature schemes. We compare two different approaches to building a digital signature scheme and illustrate how to manifest these using RSA. We then discuss practical issues concerning digital signature schemes, including different aspects of their security. We close by providing a detailed comparison between digital signatures and handwritten signatures which serves to both illustrate the strengths and vulnerabilities of digital signature schemes.Less
In this chapter, we discuss digital signature schemes. We start by considering the general requirements of a digital signature scheme. We show first that a digital signature scheme could be established using symmetric techniques. We then consider the more conventional use of public-key cryptography to create digital signature schemes. We compare two different approaches to building a digital signature scheme and illustrate how to manifest these using RSA. We then discuss practical issues concerning digital signature schemes, including different aspects of their security. We close by providing a detailed comparison between digital signatures and handwritten signatures which serves to both illustrate the strengths and vulnerabilities of digital signature schemes.
Jean-François Blanchette
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017510
- eISBN:
- 9780262301565
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017510.003.0004
- Subject:
- Information Science, Information Science
This chapter examines the gradual crystallization of a cryptographic model for an electronic equivalent to handwritten signatures. It suggests that market demise of public-key infrastructures ...
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This chapter examines the gradual crystallization of a cryptographic model for an electronic equivalent to handwritten signatures. It suggests that market demise of public-key infrastructures provided a powerful critique of the digital signature model and contends that the difficulties met in translating this model into a commercially successful technology may be attributed to cryptographers’ problematic relationship with the representational nature of models. It also discusses the trade-offs in the mathematization of cryptography.Less
This chapter examines the gradual crystallization of a cryptographic model for an electronic equivalent to handwritten signatures. It suggests that market demise of public-key infrastructures provided a powerful critique of the digital signature model and contends that the difficulties met in translating this model into a commercially successful technology may be attributed to cryptographers’ problematic relationship with the representational nature of models. It also discusses the trade-offs in the mathematization of cryptography.
Jean-Francois Blanchette
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017510
- eISBN:
- 9780262301565
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017510.001.0001
- Subject:
- Information Science, Information Science
The gradual disappearance of paper and its familiar evidential qualities affects almost every dimension of contemporary life. From health records to ballots, almost all documents are now digitized at ...
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The gradual disappearance of paper and its familiar evidential qualities affects almost every dimension of contemporary life. From health records to ballots, almost all documents are now digitized at some point of their life cycle, easily copied, altered, and distributed. This book examines the challenge of defining a new evidentiary framework for electronic documents, focusing on the design of a digital equivalent to handwritten signatures. From the blackboards of mathematicians to the halls of legislative assemblies, the book traces the path of such an equivalent: digital signatures based on the mathematics of public-key cryptography. In the mid-1990s, cryptographic signatures formed the centerpiece of a worldwide wave of legal reform and of an ambitious cryptographic research agenda that sought to build privacy, anonymity, and accountability into the very infrastructure of the Internet. Yet markets for cryptographic products collapsed in the aftermath of the dot-com boom and bust along with cryptography’s social projects. The book describes the trials of French bureaucracies as they wrestled with the application of electronic signatures to real estate contracts, birth certificates, and land titles, and tracks the convoluted paths through which electronic documents acquire moral authority. These paths suggest that the material world need not merely succumb to the virtual but, rather, can usefully inspire it. Indeed, the book argues, in renewing their engagement with the material world, cryptographers might also find the key to broader acceptance of their design goals.Less
The gradual disappearance of paper and its familiar evidential qualities affects almost every dimension of contemporary life. From health records to ballots, almost all documents are now digitized at some point of their life cycle, easily copied, altered, and distributed. This book examines the challenge of defining a new evidentiary framework for electronic documents, focusing on the design of a digital equivalent to handwritten signatures. From the blackboards of mathematicians to the halls of legislative assemblies, the book traces the path of such an equivalent: digital signatures based on the mathematics of public-key cryptography. In the mid-1990s, cryptographic signatures formed the centerpiece of a worldwide wave of legal reform and of an ambitious cryptographic research agenda that sought to build privacy, anonymity, and accountability into the very infrastructure of the Internet. Yet markets for cryptographic products collapsed in the aftermath of the dot-com boom and bust along with cryptography’s social projects. The book describes the trials of French bureaucracies as they wrestled with the application of electronic signatures to real estate contracts, birth certificates, and land titles, and tracks the convoluted paths through which electronic documents acquire moral authority. These paths suggest that the material world need not merely succumb to the virtual but, rather, can usefully inspire it. Indeed, the book argues, in renewing their engagement with the material world, cryptographers might also find the key to broader acceptance of their design goals.
Jean-François Blanchette
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017510
- eISBN:
- 9780262301565
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017510.003.0005
- Subject:
- Information Science, Information Science
This chapter traces the path of a parallel definitional process, that of the legal model for electronic signatures. It explains that this model made its way through a series of political, regulatory ...
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This chapter traces the path of a parallel definitional process, that of the legal model for electronic signatures. It explains that this model made its way through a series of political, regulatory and professional bodies in the later part of the 1990s and discusses the influence of a digital signatures on the discussion of what kind of evidence an electronically signed document might provide and how that evidence might be judged reliable. It also considers the debate between academic Lawrence Lessig and Judge Frank Easterbrook over law’s proper role in taming the unruliness of information technologies.Less
This chapter traces the path of a parallel definitional process, that of the legal model for electronic signatures. It explains that this model made its way through a series of political, regulatory and professional bodies in the later part of the 1990s and discusses the influence of a digital signatures on the discussion of what kind of evidence an electronically signed document might provide and how that evidence might be judged reliable. It also considers the debate between academic Lawrence Lessig and Judge Frank Easterbrook over law’s proper role in taming the unruliness of information technologies.
Jean-François Blanchette
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262017510
- eISBN:
- 9780262301565
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262017510.003.0001
- Subject:
- Information Science, Information Science
This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about the history of cryptographic culture and the place of evidence law in the age of electronic documents. This volume offers a ...
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This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about the history of cryptographic culture and the place of evidence law in the age of electronic documents. This volume offers a counterpoint to the preference for the analysis of the geometry of the line and describes the deployment of electronic signatures within the very professions entrusted with the production and management of documentary evidence. It also argues against the mathematization of cryptography and proposes a technical foundation for digital signatures based on the mathematics of public-key cryptography.Less
This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about the history of cryptographic culture and the place of evidence law in the age of electronic documents. This volume offers a counterpoint to the preference for the analysis of the geometry of the line and describes the deployment of electronic signatures within the very professions entrusted with the production and management of documentary evidence. It also argues against the mathematization of cryptography and proposes a technical foundation for digital signatures based on the mathematics of public-key cryptography.
