Lukas' Notes

MAC-then-Encrypt

May 01, 20261 min read

cryptography

Definition

MAC-then-Encrypt

MAC-then-Encrypt is an approach to authenticated encryption in which the MAC is computed over the plaintext, then the plaintext and MAC are encrypted together.

Security

Not Universally Secure

This approach is not secure for all possible combinations of secure ciphers and MACs. It is secure with block ciphers in CBC mode or with stream ciphers, but it was the cause of catastrophic padding-oracle attacks in TLS (POODLE and Lucky 13).


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  • Definition
  • Security

Backlinks

  • 192.019 Introduction to Security

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