Which attack can be used to find collisions in a cryptographic hash function?
- birthday attack
- chosen-plaintext attack
- ciphertext-only attack
- chosen-ciphertext attack
| Explanation & Hint:
The attack that can be used to find collisions in a cryptographic hash function is:
The birthday attack is based on the birthday paradox in probability theory, which explains that it is easier to find two random items with the same property (like a hash) than one specific item with that property. In the context of cryptographic hash functions, this attack exploits the mathematical probability that, in any set of randomly chosen hashes, there will likely be two that are the same (a collision) with less effort than would be required for a brute-force attack. This type of attack is particularly relevant when trying to find two different inputs that produce the same hash output. |