Extension Field Cancellation: A New Central Trapdoor for Multivariate Quadratic Systems [chapter]

Alan Szepieniec, Jintai Ding, Bart Preneel
2016 Lecture Notes in Computer Science  
This paper introduces a new central trapdoor for multivariate quadratic (MQ) public-key cryptosystems that allows for encryption, in contrast to time-tested MQ primitives such as Unbalanced Oil and Vinegar or Hidden Field Equations which only allow for signatures. Our construction is a mixed-field scheme that exploits the commutativity of the extension field to dramatically reduce the complexity of the extension field polynomial implicitly present in the public key. However, this reduction can
more » ... nly be performed by the user who knows concise descriptions of two simple polynomials, which constitute the private key. After applying this transformation, the plaintext can be recovered by solving a linear system. We use the minus and projection modifiers to inoculate our scheme against known attacks. A straightforward C++ implementation confirms the efficient operation of the public key algorithms.
doi:10.1007/978-3-319-29360-8_12 fatcat:dl4f6ceagzhibhnnjsmmb6padm