Secret-key-sharing Cryptosystem Using Optical Phase-shifting Digital Holography

A new secret-key-sharing cryptosystem using optical phase-shifting digital holography is proposed. The proposed secret-key-sharing algorithm is based on the Diffie-Hellman key-exchange protocol, which is modified to an optical cipher system implemented by a two-step quadrature phase-shifting digital holographic encryption method using orthogonal polarization. Two unknown users' private keys are encrypted by two-step phase-shifting digital holography and are changed into three digital-hologram ciphers, which are stored by computer and are opened to a public communication network for secret-key-sharing. Two-step phase-shifting digital holograms are acquired by applying a phase step of 0 or ${\pi}/2$ in the reference beam's path. The encrypted digital hologram in the optical setup is a Fourier-transform hologram, and is recorded on CCDs with 256 quantized gray-level intensities. The digital hologram shows an analog-type noise-like randomized cipher with a two-dimensional array, which has a stronger security level than conventional electronic cryptography, due to the complexity of optical encryption, and protects against the possibility of a replay attack. Decryption with three encrypted digital holograms generates the same shared secret key for each user. Schematically, the proposed optical configuration has the advantage of producing a kind of double-key encryption, which can enhance security strength compared to the conventional Diffie-Hellman key-exchange protocol. Another advantage of the proposed secret-key-sharing cryptosystem is that it is free to change each user's private key in generating the public keys at any time. The proposed method is very effective cryptography when applied to a secret-key-exchange cryptosystem with high security strength.