Can information encoded with a one time pad be distinguished from random noise?

Posted by Robert on Stack Overflow See other posts from Stack Overflow or by Robert
Published on 2010-03-24T18:41:19Z Indexed on 2010/03/24 18:43 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 272

Filed under:

encryption

|

cryptography

|

random

|

information-hiding

|

information-theory

I understand that the cyphertext from a properly used one time pad cypher reveals absolutely no data about the encrypted message.

Does this mean that there is no way to distinguish a message encrypted with a one time pad from completely random noise? Or is there some theoretical way to determine that there is a message, even though you can't learn anything about it?

© Stack Overflow or respective owner

Related posts about encryption

SQL SERVER – History of SQL Server Database Encryption

as seen on SQL Authority - Search for 'SQL Authority'
I recently met Michael Coles and Rodeney Landrum the author of one of the kind book Expert SQL Server 2008 Encryption at SQLPASS in Seattle. During the conversation we ended up how Microsoft is evolving encryption technology. The same discussion lead to talking about history of encryption tools in… >>> More
Encryption is hard: AES encryption to Hex

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
So, I've got an app at work that encrypts a string using ColdFusion. ColdFusion's bulit-in encryption helpers make it pretty simple: encrypt('string_to_encrypt','key','AES','HEX') What I'm trying to do is use Ruby to create the same encrypted string as this ColdFusion script is creating. Unfortunately… >>> More
Confused about encryption with public and private keys (which to use for encryption)

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I am making a licensing system when clients ask my server for a license and I send them a license if they are permitted to have one. On my current system I encrypt the license using a single private key and have the public key embedded into the client application that they use to decrypt the license… >>> More
Encryption Product Keys : Public and Private key encryption

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I need to generate and validate product keys and have been thinking about using a public/private key system. I generate our product keys based on a client name (which could be a variable length string) a 6 digit serial number. It would be good if the product key would be of a manageable length… >>> More
Software tools to automatically decrypt a file, whose encryption algorithm (and/or encryption keys)

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I have an idea for encryption that I could program fairly easily to encrypt some local text file. Given that my approach is novel, and does not use any of the industry standard encryption techniques, would I be able to test the strength of my encryption using 'cracker' apps or suchlike? Or do all… >>> More

Related posts about cryptography

Visual Basic Cryptography Question

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I am trying to mimic the results of some C code that uses the OpenSSL library using the system.security.crytography library in the .net 3.5 world, and I can't seem to get it right. I need some help... part of the issue is my understanding of crytography in general. Here's what is supposed to happen: I… >>> More
External iPhone Cryptography Libs

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
Are there any legal problems using external crypto libs in my iPhone application? I know that Apple has to comply to US cryptography export rules but do I as a developer have any responsibility? How does it work? >>> More
MD5 implementation notes

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
While going through RFC1321, I came across the following paragraph: This step uses a 64-element table T[1 ... 64] constructed from the sine function. Let T[i] denote the i-th element of the table, which is equal to the integer part of 4294967296 times abs(sin(i)), where i is in radians… >>> More
What should web programmers know about cryptography?

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
Should programmers who build websites/web applications understand cryptography? I have no idea how most crypographic algorithms work, and I really don't understand the differences between md5/des/aes/etc. Have any of you found any need for an in-depth understanding of cryptography? I haven't needed… >>> More
Java Cryptography Extension

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
I was told that in order to support AES256 encryption inside my Java app that I would need the JCE with Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files. I downloaded this from Oracle and unzipped it and I'm only seeing 2 JARs: local_policy.jar; and US_export_polic.jar I just want to confirm I'm… >>> More