Abstract
Recently, an image encryption algorithm based on scrambling and Veginère cipher has been proposed. However, it was soon cryptanalyzed by Zhang et al. using a method composed of both chosen-plaintext attack and differential attacks. This paper briefly reviews the two attack approaches proposed by Zhang et al. and outlines their mathematical interpretations. Based on these approaches, we present an improved chosen-plaintext attack to further reduce the number of chosen-plaintexts required, which is proved to be optimal. Moreover, it is found that an elaborately designed known-plaintext attack can efficiently compromise the image cipher under study. This finding is confirmed by both mathematical analysis and numerical simulations. The cryptanalyzing techniques developed in this paper provide some insights for designing secure and efficient multimedia ciphers.
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Notes
Instead of proving the effectiveness of Method II mathematically, the authors of [28] solved the problem by trying all possible combinations.
It should be noticed that pixels of the difference image between two cipher-images are not uniformly distributed in the encryption algorithm under study. It is equal to the difference of the two corresponding plain-images, as pointed out in Fact 2.
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Zeng, L., Liu, R., Zhang, L.Y. et al. Cryptanalyzing an image encryption algorithm based on scrambling and Veginère cipher. Multimed Tools Appl 75, 5439–5453 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-015-2511-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-015-2511-y