Paper 2000/019 Original: eprint.iacr.org/2000/019 ↗

Threshold Cryptography Secure Against the Adaptive Adversary, Concurrently

Abstract

A threshold cryptosystem or signature scheme is a system with $n$ participants where an honest majority can successfully decrypt a message or issue a signature, but where the security and functionality properties of the system are retained even as the adversary corrupts up to $t$ players. We present the novel technique of a committed proof, which is a new general tool that enables security of threshold cryptosystems in the presence of the adaptive adversary. We also put forward a new measure of security for threshold schemes secure in the adaptive adversary model: security under concurrent composition. Using committed proofs, we construct concurrently and adaptively secure threshold protocols for a variety of cryptographic applications. In particular, based on the recent scheme by Cramer-Shoup, we construct adaptively secure threshold cryptosystems secure against adaptive chosen ciphertext attack under the DDH intractability assumption.