Asymmetric cryptography example in C# - c#

I need to send confidential data to a server over a TCP connection. I have done a lot of researching and I understand the theoretical part. Based on what I have researched I want to do the following:
Note there is a server and a client: (we assume that public keys of either the client or server can be obtain by anyone)
client creates his public and private key. He is able to encrypt with his private key and decrypt with his public key.
server creates his public and private keys. private key is used to decrypt messages and public key is used to encrypt messages. (note is the other way around as with the client)
the client get's the server's public key. client then will be able to encrypt messages with that key and the only one that will be able to decrypt that message would be the server's private key.
since the server needs to be certain that the message comes from that specific client then the client will encrypt his name (signature) with his private key.
so the client message will contain: data to be send, client's public key, client name encrypted with the client's private key.
the client will encrypt the message with the public key from the server. client will then send that message to the server.
the server will decrypt the message it just received with his private key.
once the message is decrypted it will contain the data (info), encrypted signature, public key from client.
finally, the server will decrypt the client signature with the public key that was contained on the message to verify that the message is from that client.
OK so this is how asymmetric cryptography works. I have also researched about the classes that enable you to create this key pairs with the .NET framework. The classes that I researched that enable you do create this public and private key pairs are:
System.Security.Cryptography.DES
System.Security.Cryptography.DSACryptoServiceProvider
System.Security.Cryptography.ECDsa
System.Security.Cryptography.ECDsaCng
System.Security.Cryptography.ECDiffieHellman
System.Security.Cryptography.ECDiffieHellmanCng
System.Security.Cryptography.RSA
System.Security.Cryptography.RSACryptoServiceProvider
so now my problems comes on how do I use one of this classes to do it with C#? I understand how the theoretical part works but how do I do what I just described with code. I have researched for some examples but I am having a hard time understanding them.
here is one example that I found that I believe does what I described:
using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Text;
namespace Example
{
class Program
{
static CngKey aliceKey;
static CngKey bobKey;
static byte[] alicePubKeyBlob;
static byte[] bobPubKeyBlob;
static void Main()
{
CreateKeys();
byte[] encrytpedData = AliceSendsData("secret message");
BobReceivesData(encrytpedData);
Console.Read();
}
private static void CreateKeys()
{
aliceKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
bobKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
alicePubKeyBlob = aliceKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
bobPubKeyBlob = bobKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
}
private static byte[] AliceSendsData(string message)
{
Console.WriteLine("Alice sends message: {0}", message);
byte[] rawData = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(message);
byte[] encryptedData = null;
using (var aliceAlgorithm = new ECDiffieHellmanCng(aliceKey))
using (CngKey bobPubKey = CngKey.Import(bobPubKeyBlob,
CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob))
{
byte[] symmKey = aliceAlgorithm.DeriveKeyMaterial(bobPubKey);
Console.WriteLine("Alice creates this symmetric key with " +
"Bobs public key information: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(symmKey));
using (var aes = new AesCryptoServiceProvider())
{
aes.Key = symmKey;
aes.GenerateIV();
using (ICryptoTransform encryptor = aes.CreateEncryptor())
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
{
// create CryptoStream and encrypt data to send
var cs = new CryptoStream(ms, encryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Write);
// write initialization vector not encrypted
ms.Write(aes.IV, 0, aes.IV.Length);
cs.Write(rawData, 0, rawData.Length);
cs.Close();
encryptedData = ms.ToArray();
}
aes.Clear();
}
}
Console.WriteLine("Alice: message is encrypted: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(encryptedData)); ;
Console.WriteLine();
return encryptedData;
}
private static void BobReceivesData(byte[] encryptedData)
{
Console.WriteLine("Bob receives encrypted data");
byte[] rawData = null;
var aes = new AesCryptoServiceProvider();
int nBytes = aes.BlockSize >> 3;
byte[] iv = new byte[nBytes];
for (int i = 0; i < iv.Length; i++)
iv[i] = encryptedData[i];
using (var bobAlgorithm = new ECDiffieHellmanCng(bobKey))
using (CngKey alicePubKey = CngKey.Import(alicePubKeyBlob,
CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob))
{
byte[] symmKey = bobAlgorithm.DeriveKeyMaterial(alicePubKey);
Console.WriteLine("Bob creates this symmetric key with " +
"Alices public key information: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(symmKey));
aes.Key = symmKey;
aes.IV = iv;
using (ICryptoTransform decryptor = aes.CreateDecryptor())
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
{
var cs = new CryptoStream(ms, decryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Write);
cs.Write(encryptedData, nBytes, encryptedData.Length - nBytes);
cs.Close();
rawData = ms.ToArray();
Console.WriteLine("Bob decrypts message to: {0}",
Encoding.UTF8.GetString(rawData));
}
aes.Clear();
}
}
}
}
In this program I believe the client is Alice and the server is Bob. I have to split this program into two parts. I am having a hard time understanding it and if I give it a try most likely I will make it work. Anyways how can I split this program into a server side code and client side code. I know how to send bytes between server and client. But I don't want to make it work without understanding what is going on. maybe you guys can show me an easier example.
EDIT
I managed to separate the code: here is the server code (the ip address of my computer happened to be 192.168.0.120) :
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Net.Sockets;
using System.Net;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.IO;
namespace ServerListener
{
class Program
{
static TcpListener server;
//static CngKey aliceKey;
static CngKey bobKey;
static byte[] alicePubKeyBlob;
static byte[] bobPubKeyBlob;
static void Main(string[] args)
{
CreateKeys();
IPAddress ipAddress = IPAddress.Parse("192.168.0.120");
server = new TcpListener(ipAddress, 54540);
server.Start();
var client = server.AcceptTcpClient();
var stream = client.GetStream();
alicePubKeyBlob = new byte[bobPubKeyBlob.Length];
stream.Read(alicePubKeyBlob, 0, alicePubKeyBlob.Length);
stream.Write(bobPubKeyBlob, 0, bobPubKeyBlob.Length);
byte[] encrytpedData = new byte[32];
stream.Read(encrytpedData, 0, encrytpedData.Length);
BobReceivesData(encrytpedData);
}
private static void CreateKeys()
{
//aliceKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
bobKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
//alicePubKeyBlob = aliceKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
bobPubKeyBlob = bobKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
}
private static void BobReceivesData(byte[] encryptedData)
{
Console.WriteLine("Bob receives encrypted data");
byte[] rawData = null;
var aes = new AesCryptoServiceProvider();
int nBytes = aes.BlockSize >> 3;
byte[] iv = new byte[nBytes];
for (int i = 0; i < iv.Length; i++)
iv[i] = encryptedData[i];
using (var bobAlgorithm = new ECDiffieHellmanCng(bobKey))
using (CngKey alicePubKey = CngKey.Import(alicePubKeyBlob,
CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob))
{
byte[] symmKey = bobAlgorithm.DeriveKeyMaterial(alicePubKey);
Console.WriteLine("Bob creates this symmetric key with " +
"Alices public key information: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(symmKey));
aes.Key = symmKey;
aes.IV = iv;
using (ICryptoTransform decryptor = aes.CreateDecryptor())
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
{
var cs = new CryptoStream(ms, decryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Write);
cs.Write(encryptedData, nBytes, encryptedData.Length - nBytes);
cs.Close();
rawData = ms.ToArray();
Console.WriteLine("Bob decrypts message to: {0}",
Encoding.UTF8.GetString(rawData));
}
aes.Clear();
}
}
}
}
and here is the client code:
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Net.Sockets;
using System.Net;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.IO;
namespace ClientAlice
{
class Program
{
static CngKey aliceKey;
//static CngKey bobKey;
static byte[] alicePubKeyBlob;
static byte[] bobPubKeyBlob;
static void Main(string[] args)
{
CreateKeys();
bobPubKeyBlob = new byte[alicePubKeyBlob.Length];
TcpClient alice = new TcpClient("192.168.0.120", 54540);
var stream = alice.GetStream();
stream.Write(alicePubKeyBlob, 0, alicePubKeyBlob.Length);
stream.Read(bobPubKeyBlob, 0, bobPubKeyBlob.Length);
byte[] encrytpedData = AliceSendsData(":)");
stream.Write(encrytpedData, 0, encrytpedData.Length);
}
private static void CreateKeys()
{
aliceKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
//bobKey = CngKey.Create(CngAlgorithm.ECDiffieHellmanP256);
alicePubKeyBlob = aliceKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
//bobPubKeyBlob = bobKey.Export(CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob);
}
private static byte[] AliceSendsData(string message)
{
Console.WriteLine("Alice sends message: {0}", message);
byte[] rawData = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(message);
byte[] encryptedData = null;
using (var aliceAlgorithm = new ECDiffieHellmanCng(aliceKey))
using (CngKey bobPubKey = CngKey.Import(bobPubKeyBlob,
CngKeyBlobFormat.EccPublicBlob))
{
byte[] symmKey = aliceAlgorithm.DeriveKeyMaterial(bobPubKey);
Console.WriteLine("Alice creates this symmetric key with " +
"Bobs public key information: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(symmKey));
using (var aes = new AesCryptoServiceProvider())
{
aes.Key = symmKey;
aes.GenerateIV();
using (ICryptoTransform encryptor = aes.CreateEncryptor())
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
{
// create CryptoStream and encrypt data to send
var cs = new CryptoStream(ms, encryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Write);
// write initialization vector not encrypted
ms.Write(aes.IV, 0, aes.IV.Length);
cs.Write(rawData, 0, rawData.Length);
cs.Close();
encryptedData = ms.ToArray();
}
aes.Clear();
}
}
Console.WriteLine("Alice: message is encrypted: {0}",
Convert.ToBase64String(encryptedData)); ;
Console.WriteLine();
return encryptedData;
}
}
}
I thinks it is pretty secure. Every time it sends a different byte array although sending the same info!

As you note, you are a beginner at crypto. If this is a fun toy project to learn about crypto, great. If this is real production code you are going to implement it insecurely. You should be using off-the-shelf tools like SSL/HTTPS/whatever to solve this problem rather than doing it wrong yourself.
I'll take this opportunity to point out areas where your sketch is fatally weak.
3) the client get's the server's public key.
OK. How? This is the most important step. The security of the entire system relies upon this step, and you have completely glossed over how it works. How does the client obtain the public key of the server? What stops an evil person from calling up the client and saying "hey client, I'm the server. Here's my public key!" And now the client is encrypting messages that can only be decrypted by the evildoer. The evildoer has the real server's public key, so the evildoer re-encrypts the message with the real public key and sends it on. Your whole system is thereby compromised. The public key cryptosystem is only secure if there is a secure key exchange mechanism. (And a reasonable question then is: if you have a secure key exchange mechanism, why not simply use it to exchange the message in the first place?)
4) since the server needs to be certain that the message comes from that specific client then the client will encrypt his name (signature) with his private key.
The client should encrypt a hash of the entire message as the signature, not just a part of the message. That way the server has evidence that the whole message was from the client.
6) the client will encrypt the message with the public key from the server. client will then send that message to the server.
This is extremely inefficient. Better is for the server and client to agree upon a key to a symmetric cryptosystem. The key can be transmitted between the server and the client using the public key cryptosystem. The server and client now have a shared secret key that they can use for this communication session.
9) lastly, the server will decrypt the client signature with the public key that was contained on the message to verify that the message is from that client.
How on earth does that help anything? I want to send you a message. You want to know who it comes from. So I send you a photocopy of my drivers license, so you can compare the signature on the license with the signature on the message. How do you know I sent you my drivers license and not a photocopy of someone else's? This doesn't solve the client authentication problem at all. Again, you need to solve the key distribution problem. The system depends on there being a secure key distribution infrastructure, which you have not specified.

Posting as an answer since it would be too long for a comment - it isn't specifically answering your question though.
As mentionned in the comment by driis, you should really rely on existing solutions which are regarded as being secure. That said, your protocol does have security issues:
Communication is usually two-way, you however only seem to address one-way communication (client to server). This doesn't make much sense, since you say that you're going to use TCP, which is a two-way protocol in itself.
Steps 4 and 5 are buggy: since you send the public key of the client inside the message, anyone could create a pair and encrypt the client identification using this pair. From your description the server has no forward knowledge of the client's keys, which makes this signature do nothing but ensure the integrity of the message - specifically is does not in any way make the client identification trustworthy.
For proper identification, you do have additional prerequisites; the server has to know the client's public key in advance or it has to be able to trust the client's claim to be himself by using a trusted 3rd party. This is what certificates and the certificate trust chains are about: if that client presents a certificate issued by the 3rd party X and the server trusts X, then he can assume that the client is who he pretends to be.
SSL basically supports two modes:
Either only the server identity is verified and any client can communicate with it; the client's identity is not verified, only that (after the connection has been negotiated) it always is the same client which communicates to the server. This is the typical usage for online shopping etc. - you (as the client) trust the server and create a trusted connection, but the server does not know who you are.
Two-way authentification can be done as well by using client certificates. The server has to know and trust either the client certificate directly or the issuer of the client certificate in order to negotiate the connection successfully. In this scenario, the server does indeed know who the client is, but the prerequisite as mentioned above has to be met.

Related

AES encryptor mangles only first part of input data using initialization vector

Consider the following code (you also may check in sandbox):
using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Linq;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Text;
class EncryptionIVTest
{
private static readonly string Data = "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa";
private static readonly byte[] Password = Guid.NewGuid().ToByteArray().Take(32).ToArray();
static void Main()
{
var iv = Guid.NewGuid().ToByteArray().Take(16).ToArray(); // random initialization vector
var iv2 = new byte[16]; // just another zero-filled initialization vector
var encrypted = Encrypt(iv);
Console.WriteLine($"Original: {Data}");
Console.WriteLine($"Encrypted: {encrypted}");
Console.WriteLine($"Decrypted: {Decrypt(encrypted, iv)}");
Console.WriteLine($"Decrypted with another IV: {Decrypt(encrypted, iv2)}"); // It should throw exception or output completely mangled string
}
private static string Encrypt(byte[] iv)
{
var cipher = CreateCipher(iv);
var buf = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(Data);
using var ms = new MemoryStream();
using (var stream = new CryptoStream(ms, cipher.CreateEncryptor(), CryptoStreamMode.Write))
stream.Write(buf, 0, buf.Length);
return Convert.ToBase64String(ms.ToArray());
}
private static string Decrypt(string encrypted, byte[] iv)
{
var cipher = CreateCipher(iv);
using var ms = new MemoryStream(Convert.FromBase64String(encrypted));
using var result = new MemoryStream();
using (var stream = new CryptoStream(ms, cipher.CreateDecryptor(), CryptoStreamMode.Read))
stream.CopyTo(result);
return Encoding.UTF8.GetString(result.GetBuffer(), 0, (int)result.Length);
}
private static Aes CreateCipher(byte[] iv)
{
var cipher = Aes.Create();
cipher.Key = Password;
cipher.IV = iv;
cipher.Mode = CipherMode.CBC;
return cipher;
}
}
It outputs:
Original: aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Encrypted: EROKh8lVgREvTqzBYXjEm7EbTIT883uR9wsD82lRM14KtiOYr+/+ZpAwz/UfprqSP5mIQ7Du/d43Y88hAPjvkA==
Decrypted: aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Decrypted with another IV: ???#?n? ??7║??Paaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
The fourth string is not fully mangled, it contains an untouched trailing. It seems like encryptor only mangle first 16 bytes (size of an initialization vector) and leaves other untouched. By default, encryptor uses CBC CipherMode and it should mangle all data if I understand correctly.
Is it possible to mangle all data, not only the first part?
The purpose of the IV is not to "mangle" data further or to serve as a second encryption key - that would just make it redundant of the actual key.
The purpose is to provide additional entropy so that two sets of plaintext data encrypted with the same key but with different IVs will appear completely different when encrypted. This makes it harder for an attacker to infer anything about the data. For example, without the IV, sophisticated attackers could run statistical analyses based on language patterns and potentially figure out what certain encrypted packets actually are based on how frequently they occur.
So what you're seeing should not be surprising or concerning. The IV is doing its job.
By the way, using a Guid as a key is NOT secure. First of all it's only 16-bytes not 32 so you only have a 128-bit key basically. See https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/standard/security/generating-keys-for-encryption-and-decryption#symmetric-keys for the right apis to use to generate keys and IVs

How to Secure Private key(of Triple DES) in C# application?

Tool : OS-Windows 7 64bit, Visual Studio 2012, 4.5 .NET Framework.
Language : C#.
I have created one console application. In this application I have used Data Encryption Algorithm (DES- Symmetric Algorithm) to encrypt and decrypt data.
Now in this approach, Private or secrete key is used. I want to secure this key from client/Hack. How can I secure it?
For now I have stored KEY to the registry, And read that key from registry to encryption and decryption when required. But from registry any knowledgeable developer like you guys can easily read key.
Below is my DES algorithm code(I got this code from MSDN):
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
namespace DES_Encrypt_Decrypt
{
public class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var text = "This is Plain Text";
var encryptedText = CryptoGraphyExample.EncryptPlainTextToCipherText(text);
var decryptedText = CryptoGraphyExample.DecryptCipherTextToPlainText(encryptedText);
Console.WriteLine("Passed Text = " + text);
Console.WriteLine("EncryptedText = " + encryptedText);
Console.WriteLine("DecryptedText = " + decryptedText);
Console.ReadLine();
}
}
public class CryptoGraphyExample
{
private const string _securityKey = "MyComplexKey";
// This is my secret key and I want to secure it to the client machine.
public static string EncryptPlainTextToCipherText(string PlainText)
{
byte[] toEncryptedArray = UTF8Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(PlainText);
MD5CryptoServiceProvider objMD5CryptoService = new MD5CryptoServiceProvider();
byte[] securityKeyArray = objMD5CryptoService.ComputeHash(UTF8Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(_securityKey));
objMD5CryptoService.Clear();
var objTripleDESCryptoService = new TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider();
objTripleDESCryptoService.Key = securityKeyArray;
objTripleDESCryptoService.Mode = CipherMode.ECB;
objTripleDESCryptoService.Padding = PaddingMode.PKCS7;
var objCrytpoTransform = objTripleDESCryptoService.CreateEncryptor();
byte[] resultArray = objCrytpoTransform.TransformFinalBlock(toEncryptedArray, 0, toEncryptedArray.Length);
objTripleDESCryptoService.Clear();
return Convert.ToBase64String(resultArray, 0, resultArray.Length);
}
public static string DecryptCipherTextToPlainText(string CipherText)
{
byte[] toEncryptArray = Convert.FromBase64String(CipherText);
MD5CryptoServiceProvider objMD5CryptoService = new MD5CryptoServiceProvider();
byte[] securityKeyArray = objMD5CryptoService.ComputeHash(UTF8Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(_securityKey));
objMD5CryptoService.Clear();
var objTripleDESCryptoService = new TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider();
objTripleDESCryptoService.Key = securityKeyArray;
objTripleDESCryptoService.Mode = CipherMode.ECB;
objTripleDESCryptoService.Padding = PaddingMode.PKCS7;
var objCrytpoTransform = objTripleDESCryptoService.CreateDecryptor();
byte[] resultArray = objCrytpoTransform.TransformFinalBlock(toEncryptArray, 0, toEncryptArray.Length);
objTripleDESCryptoService.Clear();
return UTF8Encoding.UTF8.GetString(resultArray);
}
}
}
You can have a look at another answer of mine:
Where to store db passwords when using Windows .NET or ASP.NET applications
Or you can consider generating a key from a password, which you can use to encrypt the key itself:
Create a Key from a Password / Random SALT (in C#)
Either way, you should not use DES any longer as it is not secure enough any more. Triple-DES is okay if you have no other option. I recommend to use AES with a key size of 256 bit if you require a secure symmetric algorithm.
In the former Documentation Beta - "stackoverflow.com/documentation", I had added some additional information (.Net Framework -> Encryption / Cryptography). Since Beta is offline, I will provide this information here:
Create a Key from a Password / Random SALT (in C#)
using System;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Text;
public class PasswordDerivedBytesExample
{
public static void Main(String[] args)
{
// Get a password from the user.
Console.WriteLine("Enter a password to produce a key:");
byte[] pwd = Encoding.Unicode.GetBytes(Console.ReadLine());
byte[] salt = CreateRandomSalt(7);
// Create a TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider object.
TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider tdes = new TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider();
try
{
Console.WriteLine("Creating a key with PasswordDeriveBytes...");
// Create a PasswordDeriveBytes object and then create
// a TripleDES key from the password and salt.
PasswordDeriveBytes pdb = new PasswordDeriveBytes(pwd, salt);
// Create the key and set it to the Key property
// of the TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider object.
tdes.Key = pdb.CryptDeriveKey("TripleDES", "SHA1", 192, tdes.IV);
Console.WriteLine("Operation complete.");
}
catch (Exception e)
{
Console.WriteLine(e.Message);
}
finally
{
// Clear the buffers
ClearBytes(pwd);
ClearBytes(salt);
// Clear the key.
tdes.Clear();
}
Console.ReadLine();
}
#region Helper methods
/// <summary>
/// Generates a random salt value of the specified length.
/// </summary>
public static byte[] CreateRandomSalt(int length)
{
// Create a buffer
byte[] randBytes;
if (length >= 1)
{
randBytes = new byte[length];
}
else
{
randBytes = new byte[1];
}
// Create a new RNGCryptoServiceProvider.
RNGCryptoServiceProvider rand = new RNGCryptoServiceProvider();
// Fill the buffer with random bytes.
rand.GetBytes(randBytes);
// return the bytes.
return randBytes;
}
/// <summary>
/// Clear the bytes in a buffer so they can't later be read from memory.
/// </summary>
public static void ClearBytes(byte[] buffer)
{
// Check arguments.
if (buffer == null)
{
throw new ArgumentNullException("buffer");
}
// Set each byte in the buffer to 0.
for (int x = 0; x < buffer.Length; x++)
{
buffer[x] = 0;
}
}
#endregion
}
This example is taken from MSDN.
It is a console demo, and it shows how to create a secure key based on a user-defined password, and how to create a random SALT based on the cryptographic random generator.
Notes:
The built-in function PasswordDeriveBytes uses the standard PBKDF1 algorithm to generate a key from the password. Per default, it uses 100 iterations to generate the key to slow down brute force attacks. The SALT generated randomly further strenghens the key.
The function CryptDeriveKey converts the key generated by PasswordDeriveBytes into a key compatible with the specified encryption algorithm (here "TripleDES") by using the specified hash algorithm (here "SHA1"). The keysize in this example is 192 bytes, and the initialization vector IV is taken from the triple-DES crypto provider
Usually, this mechanism is used to protect a stronger random generated key by a password, which encrypts large amount of data. You can also use it to provide multiple passwords of different users to give access to the same data (being protected by a different random key).
Unfortunately, CryptDeriveKey does currently not support AES. See here.
NOTE: As a workaround, you can create a random AES key for encryption of the data to be protected with AES and store the AES key in a TripleDES-Container which uses the key generated by CryptDeriveKey. But that limits the security to TripleDES, does not take advantage of the larger keysizes of AES and creates a dependency to TripleDES.
Some machines have a TPM (Trusted Platform Module) and some also have a keychain or keystore that leverages the TPM. Macs do as do some Windows machines. Just encryption a key moves the problem to securing the encryption key.
When you get code look to see if it is current, old bad code is rarely removed from the Internet. The MDN code is completely out of date in every respect.
Do not use DES, it is no longer consider secure and 3DES is archaic and not recommended for new work. Instead use AES. DES, 3DES and AES are all symmetric keys.
Do not use MD5, it is no longer considered secure, use at least SHA256 but for password derivation use a method that uses a salt and iteration count such as PBKDF2 (Password Based Derivation Function 2).
Do not use ECB mode, it too is insecure, see ECB mode, scroll down to the Penguin.

String encryption in Objective-C decrypt in C#

I am building a iPhone app which uses a c# web service. My iPhone app takes in some data and encrypts it and passes it to the web service. How do I decrypt the data in C#?
My iPhone app contains the following code:
NSString *pString = #"Some string to be encoded";
NSString *key = #"My encryption key";
NSData *pData = [pString dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
pData = [pData AES256EncryptWithKey:key];
NSString *pID = [pData base64EncodedStringWithOptions:NSDataBase64Encoding76CharacterLineLength];
EDIT: The data is already stored in the web service so I can't readily change the encryption approach. The C# application is not on the server so there is no possibility of compromising the key.
I have tried the following C# code to decrypt the data:
static string DecryptString(string encryptedText, string key)
{
byte[] encryptedString = Convert.FromBase64String(encryptedText);
byte[] encryptionKey = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(key.Substring(0, 32));
using (var provider = new AesCryptoServiceProvider())
{
provider.Mode = CipherMode.CBC;
provider.Padding = PaddingMode.PKCS7;
provider.Key = encryptionKey;
using (var ms = new MemoryStream(encryptedString))
{
// Read the first 16 bytes which is the IV.
byte[] iv = new byte[16];
ms.Read(iv, 0, 16);
provider.IV = iv;
using (var decryptor = provider.CreateDecryptor())
{
using (var cs = new CryptoStream(ms, decryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Read))
{
using (var sr = new StreamReader(cs))
{
return sr.ReadToEnd();
}
}
}
}
}
}
However, I get the following exception:
System.Security.Cryptography.CryptographicException was unhandled
HResult=-2146233296 Message=Padding is invalid and cannot be
removed.
The encryptedText received by DecryptString is 80 bytes in length.
The sample ObjC code uses by default CBC modem, PKCS#7 padding and a default iv of 16 0x00 bytes.
The C# also uses CBC mode and PKCS#7 padding. The decryption code expects a 16-byte iv pre-pended to the encrypted data and that does not exist.
byte[] iv = new byte[16];
ms.Read(iv, 0, 16);
provider.IV = iv;
This needs to be changed so that iv is set to an array of 16 0x00 bytes and the ms.Read(iv, 0, 16) statement needs to be deleted so the decrypt function gets all of the encrypted data.
Notes:
Using a devault anything in encryption is a bad idea, always provide the correect length data.
Authentication of the encrypted data needs should be added so that it can be determined if there an incorrect key or the data has been tampered with.
There really should be a version number and a random IV used and prepended to the encrypted so you should really consider correcting this. This demonstrates why a version number generally needs to be provided and used.
RNCryptor covers the above issues.
The handling of the encryption key also needs to be considered so that is is as secure as necessary.
You need to first decode the base-64 encoded string to a byte[] - see Convert.FromBase64String(). Then you need to use the Aes class to decrypt it - there's an example on its documentation page.

RSA, SSLStream - Key Exchange

i'm using SSLStream to communicate a client and a server using OpenSSL certificates.
And the client that i will use is a machine that has it's own software, that needs to use RSA cryptography.
I made a server and a client, just to test, using my computer as client, and other computer as a server, and i made a simple key exchange, just to test the sslstream and de rsa cryptograhy between these machines.
Both machines send the public key like this:
byte[] modulus = pubkey.Modulus;
sslStream.Write(modulus, 0, modulus.Length);
sslStream.Flush();
And both machines receive the key and create like this:
byte[] exponent = {1, 0, 1};
byte[] modulus = new byte[256];
sslStream.Read(modulus, 0, modulus.Length);
clientPublicKey.D = null;
clientPublicKey.DP = null;
clientPublicKey.DQ = null;
clientPublicKey.Exponent = exponent;
clientPublicKey.InverseQ = null;
clientPublicKey.Modulus = modulus;
clientPublicKey.P = null;
clientPublicKey.Q = null;
But, testing this with the original client that i will use, the key exchange is not the same way.
Is there another way exchange keys? Because i'm sure that the original machine use another way to exchange theses keys with my server.

Get the public key from RSACryptoServiceProvider?

I'm trying to use public key encryption for communication with a client and server. The server is supposed to generate a 1024-bit public key and send it to the client, where the client will use that key to send encrypted data back to the server. So far, I've initialized the RSACryptoServiceProvider with this:
RSACryptoServiceProvider rsaEncryption = new RSACryptoServiceProvider(1024);
Now, I'm aware that I can use ExportParameters to get the exponent and modulus from the RSACryptoServiceProvider. However, I'm wondering, how can I use this data to send a public key back to the client (which would also be using an RSACryptoServiceProvider), and how can the client use this data to encrypt something to send back to me?
Or am I doing this completely wrong?
Your logic seems ok and it seems that you only need some sample code.
using System;
using System.Security.Cryptography;
using System.Text;
namespace RSA
{
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
try
{
var rsaServer = new RSACryptoServiceProvider(1024);
var publicKeyXml = rsaServer.ToXmlString(false);
var rsaClient = new RSACryptoServiceProvider(1024);
rsaClient.FromXmlString(publicKeyXml);
var data = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes("Data To Be Encrypted");
var encryptedData = rsaClient.Encrypt(data, false);
var decryptedData = rsaServer.Decrypt(encryptedData, false);
Console.WriteLine(Encoding.UTF8.GetString(decryptedData));
Console.WriteLine("OK");
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
Console.WriteLine(ex.Message);
}
Console.Read();
}
}
}
1 - Please use >= 2048 Bits in your key to be protected til ~2025.
The above is from 2012, but I came across it while trying to create a ssh-rsa key for Putty / Linux server connections.
I've just solved similar problem of creating a public ssh-rsa key in the proper format, to match PuttyGen.
For Microsoft .net RSACryptoServiceProvider it would look like this
RSACryptoServiceProvider RSA = new RSACryptoServiceProvider(3072);
byte[] sshrsa_bytes = Encoding.Default.GetBytes("ssh-rsa");
byte[] n = RSA.ExportParameters(false).Modulus;
byte[] e = RSA.ExportParameters(false).Exponent;
string buffer64;
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
{
ms.Write(ToBytes(sshrsa_bytes.Length), 0, 4);
ms.Write(sshrsa_bytes, 0, sshrsa_bytes.Length);
ms.Write(ToBytes(e.Length), 0, 4);
ms.Write(e, 0, e.Length);
ms.Write(ToBytes(n.Length+1), 0, 4); //Remove the +1 if not Emulating Putty Gen
ms.Write(new byte[] { 0 }, 0, 1); //Add a 0 to Emulate PuttyGen (remove it not emulating)
ms.Write(n, 0, n.Length);
ms.Flush();
buffer64 = Convert.ToBase64String(ms.ToArray());
}
string pubssh = string.Format("ssh-rsa {0} generated-key", buffer64);
You can see my Private Key I used for testing & the putty gen source code link https://www.cameronmoten.com/2017/12/21/rsacryptoserviceprovider-create-a-ssh-rsa-public-key/
I work at Microsoft but this is a personal answer not a Microsoft one.
Original Post for BouncyCastle (Link)

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