Extending a Key-Chain Based Certified Email Protocol with Transparent TTP

Cederquist et al. proposed an optimistic certified email protocol, which employs key chains to reduce the storage requirement of the trusted third party (TTP). We extend their protocol to satisfy the property of TTP transparency, using existing verifiably encrypted signature schemes. An implementation with the scheme based on bilinear pairing makes our extension one of the most efficient certified email protocols satisfying strong fairness, timeliness, and TTP transparency.