Digital signature method and system

1. A digital signature method involving a signer having a weak security parameter, the method comprising:

retrieving, by the signer that includes a processor, a cryptographic element from each of a plurality of computing entities, each of said cryptographic elements being a function of a commitment supplied by the signer and a private key of a respective one of the computing entities, said commitment comprising a cryptographic function of the weak security parameter provided by the signer, wherein said cryptographic function is a one-way function of at least the weak security parameter and a random variable;

generating, by the signer, a strong cryptographic security parameter using a plurality of said cryptographic elements; and

signing, by the signer, a message according to a digital signature scheme using the strong cryptographic security parameter to generate a digital signature.

2. The digital signature method of claim 1 , wherein each of the computing entities has the corresponding private key and a corresponding public key, the method further comprising:

using, by the signer, the public key of the corresponding computing entity to verify a correctness of the cryptographic element retrieved from the corresponding computing entity.

3. The digital signature method of claim 1 , wherein the strong cryptographic security parameter comprises a secret key and generating the strong cryptographic security parameter comprises one of:

computing the secret key using a key derivation function of the plurality of retrieved cryptographic elements; or

computing a plurality of contributions to the secret key, each of the contributions using a key derivation function of a respective retrieved cryptographic element, and computing the secret key as a function of the plurality of contributions to the secret key.

4. The digital signature method of claim 1 , wherein the signer belongs to a set of signers and the digital signature scheme comprises a ring signature scheme to provide an anonymous digital signature, wherein signing the message comprises signing the message using a private key derived from the strong cryptographic security parameter and public keys belonging to the set of signers.

5. The digital signature method of claim 1 , wherein the digital signature scheme uses a group credential to provide an anonymous digital signature, the method further comprising:

obtaining a credential from a credential issuer based on an anonymous signature scheme that uses a first secret key computed from the strong cryptographic security parameter.

6. The digital signature method of claim 5 , wherein the method further comprises:

encrypting the credential based on a symmetric encryption scheme that uses a second secret key computed from the strong cryptographic security parameter to generate a ciphertext;

storing the ciphertext with a credential storage server, the ciphertext being identified by an index,

wherein the ciphertext is retrievable from the credential storage server using an oblivious transfer scheme, the oblivious transfer scheme enabling the signer to retrieve the ciphertext without revealing the index.

7. The digital signature method of claim 6 , further comprising computing, by the signer, the index using the strong cryptographic security parameter retrieved based on the weak secret parameter.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the method comprises part of one or more of: a password-based concurrent signature scheme, a password-based fair exchange scheme, a signature-based password-authenticated key agreement, a password-based designated verifier signature, a password-based ring signature scheme, a password-based group signature scheme, and a password-based direct anonymous attestation scheme.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein a verifier is able to verify the digital signature using the digital signature scheme.

10. The digital signature method of claim 1 , wherein the one-way function is a one-way secure hash function.

11. A method for initializing a digital signature scheme involving a signer having a weak security parameter, the method comprising: receiving, by a computing entity including a processor, a commitment from the signer, said commitment comprising a cryptographic function that is a one-way function of at least the weak security parameter and a random variable; computing, by the computing entity, an element of a strong cryptographic security parameter as a function of the commitment and a private key of the computing entity; sending, by the computing entity, said element to the signer to cause the signer to derive the strong cryptographic security parameter from said element and one or more further elements received from one or more other computing entities, said strong cryptographic security parameter being useable in the digital signature scheme to sign a message.

12. A system for digitally signing a message comprising: a trusted entity comprising a processor and arranged to receive a weak security parameter and compute a strong cryptographic security parameter, said trusted entity being communicatively coupled to a plurality of computing entities and arranged to: transmit a commitment comprising a cryptographic function that is a one-way function of at least the weak security parameter and a random variable to each of the plurality of computing entities; receive, from each of the computing entities in response to the transmitted commitment, an element of the strong cryptographic security parameter, the element being a function of the commitment and a private key of a corresponding one of the computing entities; derive a strong cryptographic security parameter from said received elements for use in a digital signature scheme; and sign a message according to the digital signature scheme to generate a digital signature.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the trusted entity comprises a temporary virtual machine executed in memory by a processor, wherein knowledge of the weak security parameter is confined to the temporary virtual machine.

14. The system of claim 12 , wherein the trusted entity is configured to further verify a correctness of each of the received elements using a public key of the corresponding computing entity.

15. The system of claim 12 , wherein the cryptographic function is a secure hash function.

16. The system of claim 12 , wherein each of the received elements is an exponential function of the commitment and the private key of the corresponding computing entity.

17. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer program code executable by a signer having a processor to:

receive cryptographic elements from a plurality of computing entities, each of said cryptographic elements being a function of a commitment supplied by the signer and a private key of a respective one of the computing entities, said commitment comprising a cryptographic function that is a function of at least a weak security parameter provided by the signer and a random variable;

generate a strong cryptographic security parameter using a plurality of said cryptographic elements; and

sign a message according to a digital signature scheme using the strong cryptographic security parameter to generate a digital signature.