Method and apparatus for authenticating a user

摘要

A method of generating a private key for use in an authentication protocol comprises, at a client: receiving a user specific identifier; converting the identifier through a one-way function to a string of a pre-determined length; and mapping said string to a permutation &pgr;priv of a pre-determined order, said permutation being operable with a first graph G1 to generate a second graph G2=&pgr;priv(G1).