CHAMELEON: Secure, Reliable Communication Made Easy
Chameleon is a secure keyboard, which enables end-to-end encrypted communication based on the ‘Red-Black Separation Technique’.
The keyboard looks like a normal keyboard, but has the additional ability to encrypt data. The attached screen on the keyboard enables the user to see the encrypted message in plain text. The user can edit the message using the screen while also being able to read a received message after decryption. The encrypted message leaving and entering Chameleon remains unreadable to the user or any adversary.
The user can encrypt the message, which can be decryptable for any Chameleon user. The decrypted message is displayed on the Chameleon screen or the user can copy the text to his machine if further processing is required.  A digital certificate can also be inserted which makes it resilient to the Byzantine Generals Problem.
An additional layer of security is added for more delicate use-cases, which require special privileges on the device and associated software. The extended security enables the user to encrypt the message in a way so that only intended receiver can decrypt the message which is through public key cryptography. The assignment of ‘Public-Private Key Pair’ is done using the admin mode of the device. This ‘Public-Private Key Pair’ is also used to generate self-signed user certificate.
Moreover, it also works in the setting of a group. To define such a group, a fleet of Chameleon devices and two software modules are required. The software enables the system admin of the software modules to add exclusive keys specific to the system on the devices. The group is defined using attributes of the users in the group. This attribute-based encryption enables a flexible definition of such groups. The assignment of attributes to each device user is done via admin access to the software accompanying the system.
Salient Features:
- Chameleon is a secure keyboard, enabling an end-to-end encrypted keyboard.
- The attached screen on the
keyboard allows the user to see the encrypted message in plain text, which remains editable. - Example use cases include
encryption over social media (Whatsapp, Facebook, Twitter), saving text files, emails, etc. - Dual processors for red/black separation.
Full AES 256 stream cipher support. - Encryption in hardware to bypass software/OS backdoors.