Efficient and strongly secure password-based server aided key exchange

Abstract

In ACNS'06, Cliff et al. proposed the password-based server aided key exchange (PSAKE) as one of password-based authenticated key exchanges in the three-party setting (3-party PAKE) in which two clients with different passwords exchange a session key by the help of their corresponding server. Though they also studied a strong security definition of 3-party PAKE, their security model is not strong enough because there are desirable security properties which cannot be captured. In this paper, we define a new formal security model of 3-party PAKE which is stronger than the previous model. Our model captures all known desirable security requirements of 3-party PAKE, like resistance to key-compromise impersonation, to leakage of ephemeral private keys of servers and to undetectable on-line dictionary attack. Also, we propose a new scheme as an improvement of PSAKE with the optimal number of rounds for a client, which is secure in the sense of our model. © 2008 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.