MULTIPLE LEVEL PUBLIC KEY HIERARCHY FOR PERFORMANCE AND HIGH SECURITY

摘要

Multiple public/private key pairs of varying levels of security are used toprovide a high level of security while still allowing fastprocessing of encrypted information. The lower-security level includes keyswhich are small in length, which are changed relatively often,and which require less or fewer resources to implement their functions (130),(134). When it is required to change key pairs of low security,a key pair at a higher security level (i.e, longer length keys) than the lower-security level keys is used to transfer the new lower-securitypublic keys to devices using those keys. The higher-security keys can, inturn, be changed at a frequency lower than the lower-securitykeys. The higher-security keys require a higher level of resources to performtheir coding operations (120), (124). This approach of usingkeys of escalating levels of security to replace lower-security keys, wherethe higher-security keys require more resources, are more secure,and are replaced less often than the lower-security keys, can be followed asmany times as is desired to create a hierarchy of public keyuses with the result that the lower-security operations can be performedquickly while the overall system security is high.