Patent ID: 6956950

Claim:
A computer-readable medium comprising a program for encrypting a private key used in cryptography, wherein the private key conforms to a predetermined key format, the program being executable on a computer to carry out the steps of: dividing an exponent of the private key into a most significant portion and a least significant portion; encrypting the least significant portion using a secret known to a user associated with the private key; and combining the most significant portion, without encryption, and the encrypted version of the least significant portion to form a storable private key sequence, the storable private key sequence being such that a decryption of the storable private key sequence using a proposed secret other than the secret known to the user results in a decrypted pseudo-key, wherein a pseudo-key is a key that conforms to the predetermined key format but does not match the private key and wherein the number of proposed secrets that lead to a pseudo-key is larger than a security threshold; and storing the storable private key sequence as the encrypted private key.