Pure Python Data Mangling or Encrypting

[Chris Angelico]

On Wed, Jul 1, 2015 at 4:59 AM, Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info> wrote:
> Today, if the key is compromised, all is lost. Is it possible that there are
> ciphers that are resistant to discovery of the key? Obviously if you know
> the key you can read encrypted messages, that's what the key is for, but
> there are scenarios where you would want security to degrade gracefully
> instead of in a brittle all-or-nothing manner:
>
> - even if the attacker can read my messages, he cannot tamper with
>   them or write new ones as me.
>
> (I'm pretty sure that, for example, the military would consider it horrible
> if the enemy could listen in on their communications, but *even worse* if
> the enemy could send false orders that appear to be legitimate.)

That would be accomplished by a two-fold enveloping of signing and
encrypting. If I sign something using my private key, then encrypt it
using your public key, someone who's compromised your private key
could snoop and read the message, but couldn't forge a message from
me. Of course, that just means there are lots more secrets to worry
about getting compromised.

ChrisA