Abstract
In this paper we study a 128-bit-key cipher called PC1 which is used as part of the DRM system of the Amazon Kindle e-book reader. This is the first academic cryptanalysis of this cipher and it shows that PC1 is a very weak stream cipher, and can be practically broken in a known-plaintext and even in a ciphertext-only scenario.
A hash function based on this cipher has also been proposed and is implemented in the binary editor WinHex. We show that this hash function is also vulnerable to a practical attack, which can produce meaningful collisions or second pre-images.
Chapter PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Hellström, H.: Re: Good stream cipher (other than ARCFOUR). Usenet post on sci.crypt (January 18, 2002) Message id: S8K18.14572l93.3141016@newsb.telia.net
Hellström, H.: Re: stream cipher mode. Usenet post on sci.crypt (February 3, 2002) Message id: 3C5CA721.9080905@streamsec.se
i\(\heartsuit\)cabbages: Circumventing Kindle For PC DRM (updated). Blog entry (December 20, 2009) http://i-u2665-cabbages.blogspot.com/2009/12/circumventing-kindle-for-pc-drm.html
Joux, A.: Multicollisions in Iterated Hash Functions. Application to Cascaded Constructions. In: Franklin, M. (ed.) CRYPTO 2004. LNCS, vol. 3152, pp. 306–316. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)
Klimov, A., Shamir, A.: A New Class of Invertible Mappings. In: Kaliski Jr., B.S., Koç, Ç.K., Paar, C. (eds.) CHES 2002. LNCS, vol. 2523, pp. 470–483. Springer, Heidelberg (2003)
MobileRead: MobileRead Wiki — MOBI (2012), http://wiki.mobileread.com/w/index.php?title=MOBI&oldid=30301 (accessed May 14, 2012)
Pukall, A.: crypto algorithme PC1. Usenet post on fr.misc.cryptologie (October 3, 1997) Message id: 01bcd09856267aa0LocalHost@jeushtlk
Pukall, A.: Description of the PSCHF hash function. Usenet post on sci.crypt (June 9, 1997) Message id: 01bc74aaae412ae01aa54fc2@dmcwnjdz
Pukall, A.: The PC1 Encryption Algorithm – Very High Security with 128 or 256-bit keys (2004), http://membres.multimania.fr/pc1/
WinHex: WinHex webpage, http://www.x-ways.net/winhex/
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Biryukov, A., Leurent, G., Roy, A. (2013). Cryptanalysis of the “Kindle” Cipher. In: Knudsen, L.R., Wu, H. (eds) Selected Areas in Cryptography. SAC 2012. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 7707. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35999-6_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35999-6_7
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-35998-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-35999-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)