Authentication in Key-Exchange: Definitions, Relations, Composition and Post-Quantum Security

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue, “Authentication in Key-Exchange: Definitions, Relations, Composition and Post-Quantum Security”, focuses on both classical and emerging perspectives on authentication within key-exchange protocols. It aims to clarify the fundamental definitions, security concepts, and compositional properties of authentication and key-exchange and the relationships between them, thereby providing a unified and rigorous foundation for secure protocol design.

In addition to traditional models, this Special Issue places particular emphasis on post-quantum-resistant authentication mechanisms and key-exchange protocols. As global cryptographic standards transition toward post-quantum algorithms, understanding how authentication interacts with modern KEM-based, signature-based, and hybrid PQ key-exchange constructions has become essential. Submissions exploring the adaptation of classical authentication notions to the post-quantum setting, security proofs under quantum adversaries, and quantum-aware composability frameworks are especially welcome.

The Special Issue seeks contributions on the following topics:

• Formal models of authentication and key-exchange;
• Provable relations among classical and quantum-era authentication definitions;
• Composability and modular security frameworks;
• The security of hybrid or fully post-quantum authenticated key-exchange protocols;
• Protocol design and verification for next-generation cryptographic standards;
• Practical implications for real-world deployments such as TLS 1.3+, IKEv2, QUIC, PQ-TLS, and emerging hybrid KEM frameworks.

Dr. Wenting Li
Dr. Haibo Cheng
Guest Editors

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