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Re: [LinkSec] Factoid: MIC size




IPsec uses a MIC of 96 bits for similar reasons.

Russ

At 03:09 PM 9/2/2003 -0400, Leech, Marcus (EXCHANGE:FITZ:8M86) wrote:

>Under the standard birthday attack collision assumptions, the probability
>   of collision becomes significant when the number of messages under a given
>   key approachs sqrt(2^size-of-mic).
>
>That means that for a 64-bit MIC, you need to change keys before 2^32 messages
>   have been sent under a key.  For a 10gbit link, under assumption of average
>   1000-bit messages, that's a key change every 7.15 minutes or so.  That 
> impacts
>   the efficiency of the key-exchange algorithm, and the decision-point for
>   key-change (if you algorithm for key-changing is slow, you want to 
> start trying
>   to do a key-change rather early, so that there's NO possibility of 
> exceeding
>   the collision limit).
>
>Since we seem to be in the "how many bits can we realistically add to the 
>header"
>   phase, I'd vote for more MIC bits than 64.
>
>--
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>Marcus Leech                             Mail:
>Advisor                                  Phone: (ESN) 393-9145  +1 613 763 
>9145
>Security Architecture and Planning       Fax:   (ESN) 393-2754  +1 613 763 
>2754
>Nortel Networks                          mleech@nortelnetworks.com
>-----------------Expressed opinions are my own, not my employer's------