path: root/proposals/269-hybrid-handshake.txt

Filename: 269-hybrid-handshake.txt
Title: Transitionally secure hybrid handshakes
Author: John Schanck, William Whyte, Zhenfei Zhang,
        Nick Mathewson, Isis Lovecruft, Peter Schwabe
Created: 7 June 2016
Updated: 2 Sept 2016
Status: Needs-Revision


1. Introduction

  This document describes a generic method for integrating a post-quantum key
  encapsulation mechanism (KEM) into an ntor-like handshake.  A full discussion
  of the protocol and its proof of security may be found in [SWZ16].

  1.1 Motivation: Transitional forward-secret key agreement

    All currently deployed forward-secret key agreement protocols are
    vulnerable to quantum cryptanalysis. The obvious countermeasure is to
    switch to a key agreement mechanism that uses post-quantum primitives for
    both authentication and confidentiality.

    This option should be explored, but providing post-quantum router
    authentication in Tor would require a new consensus method and new
    microdescriptor elements. Since post-quantum public keys and signatures can
    be quite large, this may be a very expensive modification.

    In the near future it will suffice to use a "transitional" key agreement
    protocol -- one that provides pre-quantum authentication and post-quantum
    confidentiality. Such a protocol is secure in the transition between pre-
    and post-quantum settings and provides forward secrecy against adversaries
    who gain quantum computing capabilities after session negotiation.

  1.2 Motivation: Fail-safe plug & play for post-quantum KEMs

    We propose a modular design that allows any post-quantum KEM to be included
    in the handshake. As there may be some uncertainty as to the security of
    the currently available post-quantum KEMs, and their implementations, we
    ensure that the scheme safely degrades to ntor in the event of a complete
    break on the KEM.


2. Proposal

  2.1 Overview

    We re-use the public key infrastructure currently used by ntor.  Each
    server publishes a static Diffie-Hellman (DH) onion key. Each client is
    assumed to have a certified copy of each server's public onion key and each
    server's "identity digest". To establish a session key, we propose that the
    client send two ephemeral public keys to the server. The first is an
    ephemeral DH key, the second is an ephemeral public key for a post-quantum
    KEM. The server responds with an ephemeral DH public key and an
    encapsulation of a random secret under the client's ephemeral KEM key.  The
    two parties then derive a shared secret from: 1) the static-ephemeral DH
    share, 2) the ephemeral-ephemeral DH share, 3) the encapsulated secret, 4)
    the transcript of their communication.

  2.2 Notation

    Public, non-secret, values are denoted in UPPER CASE.
    Private, secret, values are denoted in lower case.
    We use multiplicative notation for Diffie-Hellman operations.

  2.3 Parameters

    DH                           A Diffie-Hellman primitive
    KEM                          A post-quantum key encapsulation mechanism
    H                            A cryptographic hash function

    LAMBDA            (bits)     Pre-quantum bit security parameter
    MU                (bits)     2*LAMBDA
    KEY_LEN           (bits)     Length of session key material to output

    H_LEN             (bytes)    Length of output of H
    ID_LEN            (bytes)    Length of server identity digest
    DH_LEN            (bytes)    Length of DH public key
    KEM_PK_LEN        (bytes)    Length of KEM public key
    KEM_C_LEN         (bytes)    Length of KEM ciphertext

    PROTOID           (string)   "hybrid-[DH]-[KEM]-[H]-[revision]"
    T_KEY             (string)   PROTOID | ":key"
    T_AUTH            (string)   PROTOID | ":auth"

    Note: [DH], [KEM], and [H] are strings that uniquely identify
          the primitive, e.g. "x25519"

  2.4 Subroutines

    HMAC(key, msg):
      The pseudorandom function defined in [RFC2104] with H
      as the underlying hash function.

    EXTRACT(salt, secret):
      A randomness extractor with output of length >= MU bits.

      For most choices of H one should use the HMAC based
      randomness extractor defined in [RFC5869]:
        EXTRACT(salt, secret) := HMAC(salt, secret).

      If MU = 256 and H is SHAKE-128 with MU bit output, or
      if MU = 512 and H is SHAKE-256 with MU bit output, then
      one may instead define:
        EXTRACT(salt, secret) := H(salt | secret).

    EXPAND(seed, context, len):
      The HMAC based key expansion function defined in [RFC5869].
      Outputs the first len bits of
        K = K_1 | K_2 | K_3 | ...
      where
        K_0 = empty string (zero bits)
        K_i = HMAC(seed, K_(i-1) | context | INT8(i)).

      Alternatively, an eXtendable Output Function (XOF) may be used.
      In which case,
      EXPAND(seed, context, len) = XOF(seed | context, len)

    DH_GEN() -> (x, X):
      Diffie-Hellman keypair generation. Secret key x, public key X.

    DH_MUL(P,x) -> xP:
      Scalar multiplication in the DH group of the base point P by
      the scalar x.

    KEM_GEN() -> (sk, PK):
      Key generation for KEM.

    KEM_ENC(PK) -> (m, C):
      Encapsulation, C, of a uniform random message m under public key PK.

    KEM_DEC(C, sk):
      Decapsulation of the ciphertext C with respect to the secret key sk.

    KEYID(A) -> A or H(A):
      For DH groups with long element presentations it may be desirable to
      identify a key by its hash. For typical elliptic curve groups this should
      be the identity map.

  2.5 Handshake

    To perform the handshake, the client needs to know the identity digest and
    an onion key for the router. The onion key must be for the specified DH
    scheme (e.g. x25519). Call the router's identity digest "ID" and its public
    onion key "A". The following Client Init / Server Response / Client Finish
    sequence defines the hybrid-DH-KEM protocol. See Fig. 1 for a schematic
    depiction of the same operations.

    - Client Init ------------------------------------------------------------

    The client generates ephemeral key pairs:
      x, X            = DH_GEN()
      esk, EPK        = KEM_GEN()

    The client sends a CREATE cell with contents:
      ID              [ID_LEN       bytes]
      KEYID(A)        [H_LEN        bytes]
      X               [DH_LEN       bytes]
      EPK             [KEM_PK_LEN   bytes]

    - Server Response --------------------------------------------------------

    The server generates an ephemeral DH keypair:
      y, Y            := DH_GEN()

    The server computes the three secret shares:
      s0              := H(DH_MUL(X,a))
      s1              := DH_MUL(X,y)
      s2, C           := KEM_ENC(EPK)

    The server extracts the seed:
      SALT            := ID | A | X | EPK
      secret          := s0 | s1 | s2
      seed            := EXTRACT(SALT, secret)

    The server derives the authentication tag:
      verify          := EXPAND(seed, T_AUTH, MU)
      TRANSCRIPT      := ID | A | X | EPK | Y | C | PROTOID
      AUTH            := HMAC(verify, TRANSCRIPT)

    The server sends a CREATED cell with contents:
      Y               [DH_LEN     bytes]
      C               [KEM_C_LEN  bytes]
      AUTH            [CEIL(MU/8) bytes]

    - Client Finish ----------------------------------------------------------

    The client computes the three secret shares:
      s0              := H(DH_MUL(A,x))
      s1              := DH_MUL(Y,x)
      s2              := KEM_DEC(C, esk)

    The client then derives the seed:
      SALT            := ID | A | X | EPK
      secret          := s0 | s1 | s2
      seed            := EXTRACT(SALT, secret);

    The client derives the authentication tag:
      verify          := EXPAND(seed, T_AUTH, MU)
      TRANSCRIPT      := ID | A | X | EPK | Y | C | PROTOID
      AUTH            := HMAC(verify, TRANSCRIPT)

    The client verifies that AUTH matches the tag received from the server.

    If the authentication check fails the client aborts the session.

    - Key derivation ---------------------------------------------------------

    Both parties derive the shared key from the seed:
      key             := EXPAND(seed, T_KEY, KEY_LEN).

  .--------------------------------------------------------------------------.
  | Fig. 1: The hybrid-DH-KEM handshake.                                     |
  .--------------------------------------------------------------------------.
  |                                                                          |
  | Initiator                             Responder with identity key ID     |
  | ---------                             --------- and onion key A          |
  |                                                                          |
  | x, X         := DH_GEN()                                                 |
  | esk, EPK     := KEM_GEN()                                                |
  | CREATE_DATA  := ID | A | X | EPK                                         |
  |                                                                          |
  |               --- CREATE_DATA --->                                       |
  |                                                                          |
  |                       y, Y         := DH_GEN()                           |
  |                       s0           := H(DH_MUL(X,a))                     |
  |                       s1           := DH_MUL(X,y)                        |
  |                       s2, C        := KEM_ENC(EPK)                       |
  |                       SALT         := ID | A | X | EPK                   |
  |                       secret       := s0 | s1 | s2                       |
  |                       seed         := EXTRACT(SALT, secret)              |
  |                       verify       := EXPAND(seed, T_AUTH, MU)           |
  |                       TRANSCRIPT   := ID | A | X | Y | EPK | C | PROTOID |
  |                       AUTH         := HMAC(verify, TRANSCRIPT)           |
  |                       key          := EXPAND(seed, T_KEY, KEY_LEN)       |
  |                       CREATED_DATA := Y | C | AUTH                       |
  |                                                                          |
  |               <-- CREATED_DATA ---                                       |
  |                                                                          |
  | s0           := H(DH_MUL(A,x))                                           |
  | s1           := DH_MUL(Y,x)                                              |
  | s2           := KEM_DEC(C, esk)                                          |
  | SALT         := ID | A | X | EPK                                         |
  | secret       := s0 | s1 | s2                                             |
  | seed         := EXTRACT(SALT, secret)                                    |
  | verify       := EXPAND(seed, T_AUTH, MU)                                 |
  | TRANSCRIPT   := ID | A | X | Y | EPK | C                                 |
  |                                                                          |
  | assert AUTH == HMAC(verify, TRANSCRIPT)                                  |
  | key := EXPAND(seed, T_KEY, KEY_LEN)                                      |
  '--------------------------------------------------------------------------'


3. Changes from ntor

  The hybrid-null handshake differs from ntor in a few ways.

  First there are some superficial differences.
  The protocol IDs differ:
    ntor                PROTOID         "ntor-curve25519-sha256-1",
    hybrid-null         PROTOID         "hybrid-x25519-null-sha256-1",
  and the context strings differ:
    ntor                T_MAC           PROTOID | ":mac",
    ntor                T_KEY           PROTOID | ":key_extract",
    ntor                T_VERIFY        PROTOID | ":verify",
    ntor                M_EXPAND        PROTOID | ":key_expand",
    hybrid-null         T_KEY           PROTOID | ":key",
    hybrid-null         T_AUTH          PROTOID | ":auth".

  Then there are significant differences in how the authentication tag
  (AUTH) and key (key) are derived. The following description uses the
  HMAC based definitions of EXTRACT and EXPAND.

  In ntor the server computes
    secret_input        := EXP(X,y) | EXP(X,a) | ID | A | X | Y | PROTOID
    seed                := HMAC(T_KEY, secret_input)
    verify              := HMAC(T_VERIFY, seed)
    auth_input          := verify | ID | A | Y | X | PROTOID | "Server"
    AUTH                := HMAC(T_MAC, auth_input)
    key                 := EXPAND(seed, M_EXPAND, KEY_LEN)

  In hybrid-null the server computes
    SALT                := ID | A | X
    secret_input        := H(EXP(X,a)) | EXP(X,y)
    seed                := EXTRACT(SALT, secret_input)
    verify              := EXPAND(seed, T_AUTH, MU)
    TRANSCRIPT          := ID | A | X | Y | PROTOID
    AUTH                := HMAC(verify, TRANSCRIPT)
    key                 := EXPAND(seed, T_KEY, KEY_LEN)

  First, note that hybrid-null hashes EXP(X,a). This is due to
  the fact that weaker assumptions were used to prove the security
  of hybrid-null than were used to prove the security of ntor. While
  this may seem artificial we recommend keeping it.

  Second, ntor uses fixed HMAC keys for all sessions. This is unlikely
  to be a real-world security issue, but it requires stronger assumptions
  about HMAC than if the order of the arguments were reversed.

  Finally, ntor uses a mixture of public and secret data in auth_input,
  whereas the equivalent term in hybrid-null is the public transcript.



4. Versions

  [XXX rewrite section w/ new versioning proposal]

  Recognized handshake types are:
    0x0000  TAP         --  the original Tor handshake;
    0x0001  reserved
    0x0002  ntor        --  the ntor-x25519-sha256 handshake;

  Request for new handshake types:
    0x010X  hybrid-XX   --  a hybrid of a x25519 handshake
                            and a post-quantum key encapsulation mechanism

  where
    0x0101  hybrid-null      -- No post-quantum key encapsulation mechanism.

    0x0102  hybrid-ees443ep2 -- Using NTRUEncrypt parameter set ntrueess443ep2

    0x0103  hybrid-newhope   -- Using the New Hope R-LWE scheme

        DEPENDENCY:
          Proposal 249: Allow CREATE cells with >505 bytes of handshake data



5. Bibliography

[SWZ16]   Schanck, J., Whyte, W., and Z. Zhang, "Circuit extension handshakes
          for Tor achieving forward secrecy in a quantum world", PETS 2016,
          DOI 10.1515/popets-2016-0037, June 2016.
[RFC2104] Krawczyk, H., Bellare, M., and R. Canetti,
          "HMAC: Keyed-Hashing for Message Authentication",
          RFC 2104, DOI 10.17487/RFC2104, February 1997
[RFC5869] Krawczyk, H. and P. Eronen,
          "HMAC-based Extract-and-Expand Key Derivation Function (HKDF)",
          RFC 5869, DOI 10.17487/RFC5869, May 2010


A1. Instantiation with NTRUEncrypt

  This example uses the NTRU parameter set EESS443EP2 [XXX cite] which is
  estimated at the 128 bit security level for both pre- and post-quantum
  settings.

  EES443EP2 specifies three algorithms:
    EES443EP2_GEN()          -> (sk, PK),
    EES443EP2_ENCRYPT(m, PK) -> C,
    EES443EP2_DECRYPT(C, sk) -> m.

  The m parameter for EES443EP2_ENCRYPT can be at most 49 bytes.
  We define EES443EP2_MAX_M_LEN := 49.

  0x0102  hybrid-x25519-ees443ep2-shake128-1
  --------------------
    DH            := x25519
    KEM           := EES443EP2
    H             := SHAKE-128 with 256 bit output

    LAMBDA        := 128
    MU            := 256

    H_LEN         := 32
    ID_LEN        := 20
    DH_LEN        := 32
    KEM_PK_LEN    := 615
    KEM_C_LEN     := 610
    KEY_LEN       := XXX

    PROTOID       := "hybrid-x25519-ees443ep2-shake128-1"
    T_KEY         := "hybrid-x25519-ees443ep2-shake128-1:key"
    T_AUTH        := "hybrid-x25519-ees443ep2-shake128-1:auth"

    Subroutines
    -----------
      HMAC(key, message)         := SHAKE-128(key | message, MU)
      EXTRACT(salt, secret)      := SHAKE-128(salt | secret, MU)
      EXPAND(seed, context, len) := SHAKE-128(seed | context, len)
      KEM_GEN()                  := EES443EP2_GEN()
      KEM_ENC(PK)                := (s, C)
                                    where s = RANDOMBYTES(EES443EP2_MAX_M_LEN)
                                      and C = EES443EP2_ENCRYPT(s, PK)
      KEM_DEC(C, sk)             := EES443EP2_DECRYPT(C, sk)


A2. Instantiation with NewHope

  [XXX write intro]

  0x0103  hybrid-x25519-newhope-shake128-1
  --------------------
    DH            := x25519
    KEM           := NEWHOPE
    H             := SHAKE-128 with 256 bit output

    LAMBDA        := 128
    MU            := 256

    H_LEN         := 32
    ID_LEN        := 20
    DH_LEN        := 32
    KEM_PK_LEN    := 1824
    KEM_C_LEN     := 2048
    KEY_LEN       := XXX

    PROTOID       := "hybrid-x25519-newhope-shake128-1"
    T_KEY         := "hybrid-x25519-newhope-shake128-1:key"
    T_AUTH        := "hybrid-x25519-newhope-shake128-1:auth"

    Subroutines
    -----------
      HMAC(key, message)         := SHAKE-128(key | message, MU)
      EXTRACT(salt, secret)      := SHAKE-128(salt | secret, MU)
      EXPAND(seed, context, len) -> SHAKE-128(seed | context, len)
      KEM_GEN()                  -> (sk, PK)
                                    where SEED   := RANDOMBYTES(MU)
                                          (sk,B) := NEWHOPE_KEYGEN(A_SEED)
                                          PK     := B | A_SEED
      KEM_ENC(PK)                -> NEWHOPE_ENCAPS(PK)
      KEM_DEC(C, sk)             -> NEWHOPE_DECAPS(C, sk)