NONCE GENERATION

• US 20110055580A1
• Filed: 10/06/2009
• Published: 03/03/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 09/03/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: McAfee, Inc. (McAfee, LLC)
• Original Assignee: McAfee, Inc. (McAfee, LLC)
• Inventors: Narasimhan, Srinivasan
• Granted Patent: US 8,924,721 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 713/180
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/046 comprising network management agents or mobile agents therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0893 Assignment of logical groups to network elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0811 by checking connectivity

Abstract

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for generating a nonce. In one aspect, a method includes generating, by a data processing apparatus, a source value, and hashing, by the data processing apparatus, the source value to generate the nonce.

Claims

1. A method for an authentication protocol, the method performed by data processing apparatus and comprising:

generating, by the data processing apparatus, a source value;

hashing, by the data processing apparatus, the source value to generate a nonce;

providing, by the data processing apparatus, the nonce with a query over a network;

receiving, in response to the query, reply data and an authentication code;

hashing a combination of the reply data and the nonce to generate a digest; and

determining the reply is authentic if the digest matches the authentication code.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a source value comprises:

selecting a counter value of a counter as the source value; and

incrementing the counter in response to the selection;

wherein counter values of the counter are used for source values for generating nonces.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein generating a source value comprises:

selecting a clock value of a system clock of the data processing apparatus as the source value.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein hashing the source value to generate the nonce comprises hashing the source value to generate an 8-byte hash value, the 8-byte hash value being the nonce value.

5. A method for an authentication protocol, the method performed by data processing apparatus and comprising:

generating, by the data processing apparatus, a plurality of source values;

hashing, by the data processing apparatus, the source values to generate hash values;

generating, by the data processing apparatus, a nonce from the hash values;

providing, by the data processing apparatus, the nonce with a query over a network;

receiving, in response to the query, reply data and an authentication code;

hashing, by the data processing apparatus, a combination of the reply data and the nonce to generate a digest; and

determining, by the data processing apparatus, the reply is authentic if the digest matches the authentication code.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein generating a plurality of source values comprises:

selecting a counter value of a counter as a first source value;

incrementing the counter in response to the selection; and

selecting the incremented counter value of the counter as a second source value.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein generating the nonce from the hash values comprises concatenating hash values to form the nonce value.

8. The method of claim 5, wherein generating a plurality of source values comprises:

selecting a first clock value of a system clock of the data processing apparatus as the first source value;

incrementing the first clock value to generate the second source value.

9. The method of claim 5, wherein:

hashing the source values to generate the nonce comprises hashing each source value to generate a 4-byte hash value; and

generating the nonce from the hash values comprises concatenating the 4-byte hash values to generate the nonce.

10. A computer storage medium encoded with a computer program, the program comprising instructions that when executed by data processing apparatus cause the data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:

generating a plurality of source values;

hashing the source values to generate hash values;

generating a nonce from the hash values;

providing the nonce with a query over a network;

receiving reply data and an authentication code;

hashing a combination of the reply data and the nonce to generate a digest; and

determining the reply is authentic if the digest matches the authentication code.

11. The computer storage medium of claim 10, wherein generating a plurality of source values comprises:

selecting a counter value of a counter as a first source value;

incrementing the counter in response to the selection; and

selecting the incremented counter value of the counter as a second source value.

12. The computer storage medium of claim 10, wherein generating the nonce from the hash values comprises concatenating hash values to form the nonce value.

13. The computer storage medium of claim 10, wherein generating a plurality of source values comprises:

selecting a first clock value of a system clock of the data processing apparatus as the first source value;

incrementing the first clock value to generate the second source value.

14. The computer storage medium of claim 10, wherein:

hashing the source values to generate the nonce comprises hashing each source value to generate a 4-byte hash value; and

generating the nonce from the hash values comprises concatenating the 4-byte hash values to generate the nonce.