One-Time Programs

Abstract. In this work, we introduce one-time programs, a new computational paradigm geared towards security applications. A one-time program can be executed on a single input, whose value can be specified at run time. Other than the result of the computation on this input, nothing else about the program is leaked. Hence, a one-time program is like a black box function that may be evaluated once and then "self destructs." This also extends to k-time programs, which are like black box functions that can be evaluated k times and then self destruct. One-time programs serve many of the same purposes of program obfuscation, the obvious one being software protection, but also including applications such as temporary transfer of cryptographic ability. Moreover, the applications of one-time programs go well beyond those of obfuscation, since one-time programs can only be executed once (or more generally, a limited number of times) while obfuscated programs have no such bounds. For ex...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2008
• Where: CRYPTO
• Authors: Shafi Goldwasser, Yael Tauman Kalai, Guy N. Rothblum
• Keywords: Black Box Functions, CRYPTO 2008, Cryptology, One-time Programs, Self Destructs