Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2015/366

A random zoo: sloth, unicorn, and trx

Arjen K. Lenstra and Benjamin Wesolowski

Abstract: Many applications require trustworthy generation of public random numbers. It is shown how this can be achieved using a hash function that is timed to be as slow as desired (sloth), while the correctness of the resulting hash can be verified quickly. It is shown how sloth can be used for uncontestable random number generation (unicorn), and how unicorn can be used for a new trustworthy random elliptic curves service (trx) and random-sample voting.

Category / Keywords: slow-times hash, uncontestable random numbers, trustworthy random elliptic curves service, random-sample voting

Date: received 22 Apr 2015, last revised 25 Aug 2017

Contact author: benjamin wesolowski at epfl ch

Available format(s): PDF | BibTeX Citation

Note: Some additional details and explanations.

Version: 20170825:144922 (All versions of this report)

Short URL: ia.cr/2015/366

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