4.1.2 MD5/RSA Algorithm Signature Calculation

For the MD5/RSA algorithm, the signature is as follows

      hash = MD5 ( data )

      signature = ( 01 | FF* | 00 | prefix | hash ) ** e (mod n)

where MD5 is the message digest algorithm documented in RFC 1321, "|" is concatenation, "e" is the private key exponent of the signer, and "n" is the modulus of the signer's public key. 01, FF, and 00 are fixed octets of the corresponding hexadecimal value. "prefix" is the ASN.1 BER MD5 algorithm designator prefix specified in PKCS1, that is,

           hex 3020300c06082a864886f70d020505000410 [NETSEC].

(The above specifications are identical to the corresponding part of Public Key Cryptographic Standard #1 [PKCS1].)

The size of n, including most and least significant bits (which will be 1) SHALL be not less than 512 bits and not more than 2552 bits. n and e SHOULD be chosen such that the public exponent is small.

Leading zeros bytes are not permitted in the MD5/RSA algorithm signature.

A public exponent of 3 minimizes the effort needed to decode a signature. Use of 3 as the public exponent may be weak for confidentiality uses since, if the same data can be collected encrypted under three different keys with an exponent of 3 then, using the Chinese Remainder Theorem, the original plain text can be easily recovered. This weakness is not significant for DNS because we seek only authentication, not confidentiality.