Alice and Bob meet equational theories

Abstract

Cryptographic protocols are the backbone of secure communication over open networks and their correctness is therefore crucial. Tool-supported formal analysis of cryptographic protocol designs increases our confidence that these protocols achieve their intended security guarantees. We propose a method to automatically translate textbook style Alice&Bob protocol specifications into a format amenable to formal verification using existing tools. Our translation supports specification modulo equational theories, which enables the faithful representation of algebraic properties of a large class of cryptographic operators.