Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2012 09:51:56 +0300
From: Ivaylo Hubanov <sniffski@...il.com>
To: full-disclosure@...ts.grok.org.uk
Subject: Re: stealing ssh keys

Yes Raj,
You almost got the RSA encryption/decryption flow. :) Just the private key
is used to sign the data and not to encrypt it.
Check this "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-key_cryptography"
Each user has a pair of cryptographic
keys<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptographic_key> -
a *public encryption key* and a *private decryption key*.
...

The two main uses for public-key cryptography are:

- Public-key encryption: a message encrypted with a recipient's public key
cannot be decrypted by anyone except a possessor of the matching private
key - it is presumed that this will be the owner of that key and the person
associated with the public key used. This is used to attempt to ensure
confidentiality <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confidentiality>.

- Digital signatures <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_signature>: a
message signed with a sender's private key can be verified by anyone who
has access to the sender's public key, thereby proving that the sender had
access to the private key and, therefore, is likely to be the person
associated with the public key used. This also ensures that the message has
not been tampered with (on the question of
authenticity<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authentication>,
see also message digest <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_digest>).

regards,
sniffski

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