The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 21, 1996
Filed:
Sep. 26, 1994
Frank T Leighton, Newtonville, MA (US);
Silvio Micali, Brookline, MA (US);
Other;
Abstract
The present invention describes a method for enabling users of a cryptosystem to agree on secret keys. In one embodiment, a trusted agent chooses at least one individual key for each user, with at least a portion of such individual key being secret. At least some of the individual keys are then stored in physically secure devices, and the pair of users i and j use their individual keys to compute a common secret key. In another embodiment, each trustee of a group of trustees choose at least one individual key for each user, with at least some portion of such individual key being secret. The keys chosen by a sufficiently small number of such trustees, however, are insufficient for computing the common secret key of the users. Other hardware and software key exchange protocols based on these two techniques are also disclosed.