2 ms·
A major result in post-quantum cryptography. A key security assumption behind Classic McEliece, a public-key encryption system considered to resist quantum comp
by weeha 2mo ago
A major result in post-quantum cryptography. A key security assumption behind Classic McEliece, a public-key encryption system considered to resist quantum computers, has been undermined. Researchers found a provable quasipolynomial-time method for detecting the hidden mathematical structure in its public keys. The attack is still astronomically expensive and cannot yet decrypt messages, but this is a serious weakening of one of the oldest post-quantum cryptosystems. McEliece is not broken practically today, but an important assumption underlying its theoretical security has been broken. For the Classic McEliece parameter sets, the estimated cost of the best known structural distinguisher drops from roughly 2^298-2^691 operations to about 2^114-2^124. That is huge.
- wahern 2mo ago> A key security assumption behind Classic McEliece, a public-key encryption system considered to resist quantum computers, has been undermined Classic McEliece was explicitly designed not to rely on distinguishing resistance for security. See this rebuttal of an earlier distinguishing attack: https://classic.mceliece.org/mceliece-610-20260623.pdf https://classic.mceliece.org/mceliece-610-20260623.pdf See also https://postquantum.com/security-pqc/mceliece-quasipolynomial-distinguisher/ https://postquantum.com/security-pqc/mceliece-quasipolynomia... ("Public-key pseudorandomness is a property other people assumed, not one Classic McEliece promised. A distinguisher running in 2114 operations violates no claim the team has ever made, and anyone reporting this as a break should say which claim they think fell.")