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CONIKS: Bringing Key Transparency to End Users
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Melara"> <meta name="citation_author" content="Aaron Blankstein"> <meta name="citation_author" content="Joseph Bonneau"> <meta name="citation_author" content="Edward W. Felten"> <meta name="citation_author" content="Michael J. Freedman"> <meta name="citation_journal_title" content="Cryptology ePrint Archive"> <meta name="citation_publication_date" content="2014"> <meta name="citation_pdf_url" content="https://eprint.iacr.org/2014/1004.pdf"> <meta property="og:image" content="https://eprint.iacr.org/img/iacrlogo.png"/> <meta property="og:image:alt" content="IACR logo"/> <meta property="og:url" content="https://eprint.iacr.org/2014/1004"> <meta property="og:site_name" content="IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive" /> <meta property="og:type" content="article" /> <meta property="og:title" content="CONIKS: Bringing Key Transparency to End Users" /> <meta property="og:description" content="We present CONIKS, an end-user key verification service capable of integration in end-to-end encrypted communication systems. CONIKS builds on transparency log proposals for web server certificates but solves several new challenges specific to key verification for end users. CONIKS obviates the need for global third-party monitors and enables users to efficiently monitor their own key bindings for consistency, downloading less than 20 kB per day to do so even for a provider with billions of users. CONIKS users and providers can collectively audit providers for non-equivocation, and this requires downloading a constant 2.5 kB per provider per day. Additionally, CONIKS preserves the level of privacy offered by today’s major communication services, hiding the list of usernames present and even allowing providers to conceal the total number of users in the system." /> <meta property="article:section" content="" /> <meta property="article:modified_time" content="2017-04-27T19:30:44+00:00" /> <meta property="article:published_time" content="2014-12-18T03:54:54+00:00" /> <meta property="article:tag" content="Public key verification" /> <meta property="article:tag" content="key transparency" /> <meta property="article:tag" content="end-to-end secure communication" /> </head> <body> <noscript> <h1 class="text-center">What a lovely hat</h1> <h4 class="text-center">Is it made out of <a href="https://iacr.org/tinfoil.html">tin foil</a>?</h4> </noscript> <div class="fixed-top" id="topNavbar"> <nav class="navbar navbar-custom navbar-expand-lg"> <div class="container px-0 justify-content-between justify-content-lg-evenly"> <div class="order-0 align-items-center d-flex"> <button class="navbar-toggler btnNoOutline" type="button" data-bs-toggle="collapse" data-bs-target="#navbarContent" aria-controls="navbarContent" aria-expanded="false"> <span class="icon-bar top-bar"></span> <span class="icon-bar middle-bar"></span> <span class="icon-bar bottom-bar"></span> </button> <a class="d-none me-5 d-lg-inline" href="https://iacr.org/"><img class="iacrlogo" src="/img/iacrlogo_small.png" alt="IACR Logo" style="max-width:6rem;"></a> </div> <a class="ePrintname order-1" href="/"> <span class="longNavName">Cryptology ePrint Archive</span> </a> <div class="collapse navbar-collapse order-3" id="navbarContent"> <ul class="navbar-nav me-auto ms-2 mb-2 mb-lg-0 justify-content-end w-100"> <li class="ps-md-3 nav-item dropdown"> <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="navbarDropdown" role="button" data-bs-toggle="dropdown" aria-expanded="false"> Papers </a> <ul class="dropdown-menu me-3" aria-labelledby="navbarDropdown"> <span class="text-dark mx-3" style="white-space:nowrap;">Updates from the last:</span> <li><a class="dropdown-item ps-custom" href="/days/7">7 days</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item ps-custom" href="/days/31">31 days</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item ps-custom" href="/days/183">6 months</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item ps-custom" href="/days/365">365 days</a></li> <li><hr class="dropdown-divider"></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/byyear">Listing by year</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/complete">All papers</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/complete/compact">Compact view</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="https://www.iacr.org/news/subscribe">Subscribe</a></li> <li><hr class="dropdown-divider"></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/citation.html">How to cite</a></li> <li><hr class="dropdown-divider"></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/rss">Harvesting metadata</a></li> </ul> </li> <li class="ps-md-3 nav-item dropdown"> <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="submissionsDropdown" role="button" data-bs-toggle="dropdown" aria-expanded="false"> Submissions </a> <ul class="dropdown-menu me-3" aria-labelledby="submissionsDropdown"> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/submit">Submit a paper</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/revise">Revise or withdraw a paper</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/operations.html">Acceptance and publishing conditions</a></li> </ul> </li> <li class="ps-md-3 nav-item dropdown"> <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="aboutDropdown" role="button" data-bs-toggle="dropdown" aria-expanded="false"> About </a> <ul class="dropdown-menu me-3" aria-labelledby="aboutDropdown"> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/about.html">Goals and history</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/news.html">News</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/stats">Statistics</a></li> <li><a class="dropdown-item" href="/contact.html">Contact</a></li> </ul> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="dropdown ps-md-2 text-right order-2 order-lg-last"> <button class="btn btnNoOutline" type="button" id="dropdownMenuButton1" data-bs-toggle="dropdown" aria-expanded="false"> <img src="/img/search.svg" class="searchIcon" alt="Search Button"/> </button> <div id="searchDd" class="dropdown-menu dropdown-menu-end p-0" aria-labelledby="dropdownMenuButton1"> <form action="/search" method="GET"> <div class="input-group"> <input id="searchbox" name="q" type="search" class="form-control" autocomplete="off"> <button class="btn btn-secondary border input-group-append ml-2"> Search </button> </div> </form> <div class="ms-2 p-1 d-none"><a href="/search">Advanced search</a></div> </div> </div> </div> </nav> </div> <main id="eprintContent" class="container px-3 py-4 p-md-4"> <div class="row mt-4"> <div class="col-md-7 col-lg-8 pe-md-5"> <h4>Paper 2014/1004</h4> <h3 class="mb-3">CONIKS: Bringing Key Transparency to End Users</h3> <p class="fst-italic mb-3"> Marcela S. Melara, Aaron Blankstein, Joseph Bonneau, Edward W. Felten, and Michael J. Freedman </p> <h5 class="mt-3">Abstract</h5> <p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">We present CONIKS, an end-user key verification service capable of integration in end-to-end encrypted communication systems. CONIKS builds on transparency log proposals for web server certificates but solves several new challenges specific to key verification for end users. CONIKS obviates the need for global third-party monitors and enables users to efficiently monitor their own key bindings for consistency, downloading less than 20 kB per day to do so even for a provider with billions of users. CONIKS users and providers can collectively audit providers for non-equivocation, and this requires downloading a constant 2.5 kB per provider per day. Additionally, CONIKS preserves the level of privacy offered by today’s major communication services, hiding the list of usernames present and even allowing providers to conceal the total number of users in the system.</p> <p><strong>Note:</strong> Revision to correct security error in the VRF scheme: Earlier versions of this paper reproduced an error contained in the scheme in Franklin and Zhang’s original paper. It has since been fixed in Franklin and Zhang’s paper as well as this paper. Thanks to Sharon Goldberg and Leonid Reyzin for finding this error.</p> </div> <div id="metadata" class="col-md-5 col-lg-4 ps-md-5 mt-4 mt-md-0"> <h5>Metadata</h5> <dl> <dt> Available format(s) </dt> <dd> <a class="btn btn-sm btn-outline-dark" href="/2014/1004.pdf"> <img class="icon" src="/img/file-pdf.svg">PDF</a> </dd> <dt>Publication info</dt> <dd>Published elsewhere. USENIX Security '15</dd> <dt>Keywords</dt> <dd class="keywords"><a href="/search?q=Public%20key%20verification" class="me-2 badge bg-secondary keyword">Public key verification</a><a href="/search?q=key%20transparency" class="me-2 badge bg-secondary keyword">key transparency</a><a href="/search?q=end-to-end%20secure%20communication" class="me-2 badge bg-secondary keyword">end-to-end secure communication</a></dd> <dt>Contact author(s)</dt> <dd><span class="font-monospace"> melara<span class="obfuscate"> @ </span>cs princeton edu </span> </dd> <dt>History</dt> <dd>2017-04-27: last of 7 revisions</dd> <dd>2014-12-18: received</dd> <dd><a rel="nofollow" href="/archive/versions/2014/1004">See all versions</a></dd> <dt>Short URL</dt> <dd><a href="https://ia.cr/2014/1004">https://ia.cr/2014/1004</a></dd> <dt>License</dt> <dd><a rel="license" target="_blank" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"> <img class="licenseImg" src="/img/license/CC_BY.svg" alt="Creative Commons Attribution" title="Creative Commons Attribution"><br> <small>CC BY</small> </a> </dd> </dl> </div> </div> <p class="mt-4"><strong>BibTeX</strong> <button id="bibcopy" class="ms-2 btn btn-sm btn-outline-dark" aria-label="Copy to clipboard" onclick="copyBibtex()"> <img src="/img/copy-outline.svg" class="icon">Copy to clipboard</button></p> <pre id="bibtex"> @misc{cryptoeprint:2014/1004, author = {Marcela S. Melara and Aaron Blankstein and Joseph Bonneau and Edward W. Felten and Michael J. Freedman}, title = {{CONIKS}: Bringing Key Transparency to End Users}, howpublished = {Cryptology {ePrint} Archive, Paper 2014/1004}, year = {2014}, url = {https://eprint.iacr.org/2014/1004} } </pre> <script> var bibcopy; function triggerTooltip() { console.log('setting tooltip'); } window.onload = triggerTooltip; function copyBibtex() { let range = document.createRange(); range.selectNode(document.getElementById('bibtex')); window.getSelection().removeAllRanges(); window.getSelection().addRange(range); document.execCommand('copy'); window.getSelection().removeAllRanges(); let bibcopy = document.getElementById('bibcopy'); let copyTooltip = new bootstrap.Tooltip(bibcopy, {trigger: 'manual', title: 'Copied!'}); copyTooltip.show(); setTimeout(function() { copyTooltip.dispose(); }, 2000); } </script> </main> <div class="container-fluid mt-auto" id="eprintFooter"> <a href="https://iacr.org/"> <img id="iacrlogo" src="/img/iacrlogo_small.png" class="img-fluid d-block mx-auto" alt="IACR Logo"> </a> <div class="colorDiv"></div> <div class="alert alert-success w-75 mx-auto"> Note: In order to protect the privacy of readers, eprint.iacr.org does not use cookies or embedded third party content. </div> </div> <script src="/css/bootstrap/js/bootstrap.bundle.min.js"></script> <script> var topNavbar = document.getElementById('topNavbar'); if (topNavbar) { document.addEventListener('scroll', function(e) { if (window.scrollY > 100) { topNavbar.classList.add('scrolled'); } else { topNavbar.classList.remove('scrolled'); } }) } </script> </body> </html>