Reply to Comment on "Exposed-key weakness of $\alpha \eta$"

TL;DR

This paper defends the original claim about the security weakness of the $\alpha \eta$ encryption scheme by providing simulations that support their entropy estimates, countering criticisms in a comment.

Contribution

The authors demonstrate through simulations that their entropy approximation for $\alpha \eta$ remains valid, clarifying misconceptions about the scheme's security.

Findings

Simulations confirm the validity of the entropy approximation.

The paper clarifies differing views on security requirements.

Counter-arguments to the criticism are supported by numerical evidence.

Abstract

We address criticism of the Letter "Exposed-Key Weakness of $\alpha \eta$" in the Comment by Nair and Yuen. The Comment claims that the Letter does not show insecurity of $\alpha \eta$ because our approximation for the eavesdropper's entropy on the encrypted key is invalid. We present simulations which show that, on the contrary, our estimate is in close agreement with numerical calculations of the actual entropy over the applicable domain. We additionally discuss some ways in which our views on security requirements differ from the views given in the Comment.