{"id":13254,"date":"2021-12-08T20:13:06","date_gmt":"2021-12-09T01:13:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/?page_id=13254"},"modified":"2026-06-02T14:59:23","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:59:23","slug":"tr-08-08-weighing-down-the-unbearable-lightness-of-pin-cracking-extended-version","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/research\/scs-technical-reports\/technical-reports-2008\/tr-08-08-weighing-down-the-unbearable-lightness-of-pin-cracking-extended-version\/","title":{"rendered":"TR-08-08: Weighing Down “The Unbearable Lightness of PIN Cracking” (Extended Version)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Carleton University
\nTechnical Report<\/a> TR-08-08
\nApril 29, 2008<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weighing Down “The Unbearable Lightness of PIN Cracking” (Extended Version)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Mohammad Mannan & Paul Van Oorschot<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Abstract<\/h3>\n

Responding to the PIN cracking attacks from Berkman and Ostrovsky (FC 2007), we outline a simple solution called salted-PIN. A randomly generated salt value of adequate length (e.g. 128-bit) is stored on a bank card in plaintext, and in an encrypted form at a verification facility under a bank-chosen salt key. Instead of sending the regular user PIN, salted-PIN requires an ATM to generate a Transport Final PIN from a user PIN, account number, and the salt value (stored on the bank card) through, e.g., a pseudo-random function. We explore different attacks on this solution, and propose three variants of salted-PIN that can protect against known attacks. Depending on the solution variation, attacks at a malicious intermediate switch now may only reveal the Transport Final PIN; both the user PIN and salt value remain beyond the reach of an attacker’s switch. Salted-PIN requires modifications to service points (e.g. ATM, point-of-sale), issuer\/verification facilities, and bank cards; however, changes to intermediate switches are not required.<\/p>\n

TR-08-08.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Carleton University Technical Report TR-08-08 April 29, 2008 Weighing Down “The Unbearable Lightness of PIN Cracking” (Extended Version) Mohammad Mannan & Paul Van Oorschot Abstract Responding to the PIN cracking attacks from Berkman and Ostrovsky (FC 2007), we outline a simple solution called salted-PIN. A randomly generated salt value of adequate length (e.g. 128-bit) is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":12410,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cu_dining_location_slug":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_page_type":[],"class_list":["post-13254","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13254"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13255,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13254\/revisions\/13255"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/12410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_page_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/scs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_page_type?post=13254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}