Table of Contents for

Cryptography and Network Security

Preface

Today, most people are already familiar with security related concepts due to the availability of ubiquitous technology and exposure to the Internet. Digital marketing trends reflect the use of many cryptographic and network security related concepts in day-to-day activities. This aspect motivated us to bring technical knowledge to common people who are interested in knowing the internal functionality of online transactions.

This book delineates the essential and underlying principles of cryptography and network security for non-specialist readers also. It targets readers who are interested in an elaborate description about the subject and balances theory with sound practical approaches. We strongly believe that this book will help the readers to realise what happens technically in real-time online transaction scenarios.

The book would also be useful for experts since during the writing process, unknown technical concepts have been retrofit for the benefit of known users and vice versa. The pedagogy followed in the book induces an interest in the reader to explore more about the subject. The beginning portion of the book explains basic concepts clearly for the first-time learners without intimidating them. A literature survey made by our research team concluded that there is a need for a new cryptographic text book to discuss recent advancements in this field. Hence, this book was written from the reader’s perspective and highly supported to notify recent versions of protocols and latest terminologies. Such notifications have been presented in an easy adoptable way. In addition, one of the book’s strengths is that it interprets leading edge concepts using an approach easily accessible to the reader.

This book offers an excellent introduction to the field of cryptography and network security concepts because of its comprehensive and precise structure. We encourage the reader to read all chapters of the book to understand the topics in their entirety. At the same time, the book can also be used as a textbook at the graduate and post-graduate level since it covers both fundamental theory and new technologies. It covers almost all technical concepts of cryptography and network security step by step covering all of them to the requisite detail. The necessary backgrounds to illustrate the principles are presented in a well-organised manner. In addition, Java implementations of almost all cryptographic algorithms are laid out in the book.

The book discusses the broad spectrum of cryptography and network security in a distributed technical environment by analysing the basics of the subject such as mathematics of modern cryptography, authentication techniques, etc. while also delving into examples that suit the present-day working environment. Materials for the book were collected from various academic and non-academic technical experts and collated to showcase important recent advances in the area of cryptography and network security.

Organisation of the book

This book plays a dual role as reference book and text book. The readers are graduate, post-graduate students and technical experts. This section offers an overview and suggestions to derive the best out of this book.

Chapter 1 provides an insight into the fundamental ideas about cryptography and it needs to be read first by beginners. This chapter discusses various security trends, services and several types of attacks on network security recorded in literature. It may not be necessary for the subject experts to go through this chapter.

Chapter 2 ensures a fair degree of mathematical knowledge, and its application in cryptographic field. It provides some discussions on basic number theory and solutions for congruence, which are necessary for the analytics of cryptographic algorithms. The upcoming chapters build on one another to provide a comprehensive understanding of the subject.

Chapter 3 elucidates the conventional encryption model, substitution and transposition techniques, which are useful to learn about modern ciphers. Essential illustration and examples are provided for the underlying concepts.

Chapter 4 concentrates on Data Encryption Standard (DES) and discusses it as simplified DES.
Further, it presents the strength of DES and its different modes of operation.

Chapter 5 discusses secure block cipher and stream cipher techniques with Double DES and Triple DES principles.

Chapter 6 outlines the structure of AES and its working principles. This chapter also analyses AES key expansion algorithm with exercises.

Chapter 7 explores public key cryptography with asymmetric key algorithm RSA. The chapter gives technical explanation of RSA algorithm and its attacks with several examples.

Chapter 8 deals with key management and key distribution and provides a proper explanation of the Diffie–Hellman key exchange algorithm. Implementation of secure multicast key management based on GCD is also illustrated in this chapter.

Chapter 9 provides details about elliptic curve cryptography.

Chapter 10 focuses on authentication techniques that prevent misuse of resources. This chapter
describes about message authentication code, standard hash functions like MD hash family, Whirlpool and SHA. In addition, it also reviews the importance of hash value and its vital role in security aspect. Message digest creation steps of individual hash functions are illustrated with block diagrams.

Chapter 11 expounds on the use of various digital signature schemes. It elaborates on how the digital signature is designed, signed and verified with worked-out examples. Techniques, attacks and applications of digital signatures are also mentioned. Key generation of DSA is explained in detail with java code implementation.

Chapter 12 reveals authentication applications and describes how Kerberos achieves centralised authentication with its two versions. X.509 authentication service explains the scope of public key cryptography and digital signatures for security.

Chapter 13 enumerates the methods of protecting web applications in the Application Layer of ISO/OSI model and analyses security methods that control malicious attacks and protect against unauthorised access. The chapter also presents a case study of PGP and S/MIME.

Chapter 14 is centred on Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Transport Layer Security (TLS) and their practical application in E-com. The necessity to create a secure link between two machines for Web applications in the transport layer is spelt out with detailed architecture.

Chapter 15 examines IP security architecture, which ensures private and secure communication with the support of cryptographic security services. The benefits of integrating IP security are also explained.

Chapter 16 takes a close look at the necessity for protecting the system from unauthorised access, concentrating on various levels such as password management, program, operating system, network and database. At each level, the occurrence of different threats and the preventive measures to overcome those threats are detailed.

Appendix carries the frequently asked university questions and answers.

Index is included at the end of the book.

This book inspires readers with technical fun. We hope the reader can feel the soul of scientific art in this book. Thank you for participating in our technical ride.

S. Bose

P. Vijayakumar