Paper 2025/2004

Re-randomization Attack on the Certificateless Encryption Scheme proposed by Guo et al.

Nobuyuki Sugio, Hokkaido University of Science
Keita Emura, Kanazawa University
Toshihiro Ohigashi, Tokai University
Abstract

Guo, Li, and Qin proposed a lightweight certificateless encryption (CLE) scheme designed for IoT environments (\textit{Discover Computing}, 2025). This paper demonstrates that the proposed scheme does not achieve CCA security, contrary to the authors' claim. Specifically, we identify two critical points. First, since the ciphertext retains a multiplicative ElGamal structure, it can always be re-randomized using arbitrary randomness. Second, based on this property, an adversary can transform a challenge ciphertext into another valid ciphertext of the same plaintext, and then query the decryption oracle with the transformed ciphertext to recover the challenge plaintext. This attack exploits a definitional gap in the CCA game, where only direct decryption queries on the challenge ciphertext are prohibited. In this work, we formalize the attack procedure and verify its validity based on implementation.

Metadata
Available format(s)
PDF
Category
Public-key cryptography
Publication info
Preprint.
Keywords
Certificateless EncryptionRe-randomization AttackCCABilinear MapIoT Security
Contact author(s)
sugio-n @ hus ac jp
k-emura @ se kanazawa-u ac jp
ohigashi @ tokai ac jp
History
2025-10-30: approved
2025-10-27: received
See all versions
Short URL
https://ia.cr/2025/2004
License
Creative Commons Attribution
CC BY

BibTeX

@misc{cryptoeprint:2025/2004,
      author = {Nobuyuki Sugio and Keita Emura and Toshihiro Ohigashi},
      title = {Re-randomization Attack on the Certificateless Encryption Scheme proposed by Guo et al.},
      howpublished = {Cryptology {ePrint} Archive, Paper 2025/2004},
      year = {2025},
      url = {https://eprint.iacr.org/2025/2004}
}
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