Randomness in Distribution Protocols

Abstract

Randomness is a useful computation resource due to its ability to enhance the capabilities of other resources. Its interaction with resources such as time, space, interaction with provers and its role in several areas of computer science has been extensively studied. In this paper we give a systematic analysis of the amount of randomness needed by secret sharing schemes and secure key distribution schemes. We give both upper and lower bounds on the number of random bits needed by secret sharing schemes. The bounds are tight for several classes of secret sharing schemes. For secure key distribution schemes we provide a lower bound on the amount of randomness needed, thus showing the optimality of a recently proposed key distribution protocol. © 1996 Academic Press.