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Is it possible to re-randomize a ciphertext with the Cramer-Shoup System? I have some Cramer-Shoup ciphertexts and i want to re-randomize them, so they look different and are unlinkable to there previous form, but still can be decrypted with the original secret-key. Is this possible?

And if it is, would it still be possible using the Camenisch-Shoup System, which calculates a Proof, so someone knows that the "real original value" is encrypted, without decrypting the ciphertext? I hope this is written clear enough Thank you.

2 Answers2

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@hakoja correctly points out that what you are asking for is not compatible with CCA security (the security property that Cramer-Shoup satisfies). More specifically, you seem to be looking for a rerandomizable, RCCA-secure encryption scheme. These two properties mean:

  • Rerandomizable: Given an encryption of an unknown $m$, there is a way to generate fresh samples from $\textsf{Enc}(k,m)$.

  • Replayable CCA (RCCA): The scheme is non-malleable except for the possibility of modifying a ciphertext $c$ into another ciphertext $c'$ where $\textsf{Dec}(k,c) = \textsf{Dec}(k,c')$. Basically, the scheme is malleable only in ways that preserve the plaintext; otherwise it is non-malleable.

Rerandomizable RCCA means that the randomization feature is the "only malleability" of the scheme. These are not too hard to achieve together, but they become non-trivial when you include another requirement:

  • Unlinkability: Given $c = \textsf{Enc}(k,m)$ for an unknown $m$, it is hard to tell whether some other $c'$ is an independent encryption of $m$ or a rerandomization of $c$. In order to make sense, this property should hold even in the presence of chosen-ciphertext attacks (i.e., against attackers that have access to the decryption function), which makes it difficult. It often means that the rerandomization procedure must refresh all the randomness in a ciphertext.

In the paper below, we were the first to construct a rerandomizable RCCA scheme:

Prabhakaran & Rosulek: Rerandomizable RCCA Encryption, CRYPTO 2007

The scheme is about 5-6x more expensive than Cramer-Shoup, and it relies on DDH holding in some groups with related order. There is a later followup work that gives different constructions of rerandomizable RCCA from pairing-based groups:

Chase, Kohlweis, Lysyanskaya, Meikeljohn: Malleable Proof Systems and Applications. Eurocrypt 2012.

Mikero
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Answering only your first question: no, that's not possible. Essentially, if it was possible to randomize the ciphertext of Cramer-Shoup, then it wouldn't be IND-CCA2 secure. However it is IND-CCA2 secure, so it cannot be re-randomizable.

hakoja
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