Human memory-based key generation and retrieval protocol arrangement for secure electronic signature generation

摘要

The invention provides an alternative to key storage of public-key cryptosystems, which is usually one of the weakest points when attacked. This is because, no matter how secure the physical memory we use to store the private key, at one point authentication is required to retrieve it. Therefore, we are running two risks here: one being the risk of breaking the memory storing the key, the other is to get the authentication information (which can be knowledge-based, token-based or biometric). The alternative proposed needs no storage of the key, nor does it need the user to remember newly generated authentication information (e.g. password), which is of limited length. It instead relies on already existing knowledge (memory) of the user.