Secret Key and Private Key Constructions for Simple Multiterminal Source Models

This work is motivated by recent results of Csiszar and Narayan (IEEE Trans. on Inform. Theory, Dec. 2004), which highlight innate connections between secrecy generation by multiple terminals and multiterminal Slepian-Wolf near-lossless data compression (sans secrecy restrictions). We propose a new approach for constructing secret and private keys based on the long-known Slepian-Wolf code for sources connected by a virtual additive noise channel, due to Wyner (IEEE Trans. on Inform. Theory, Jan. 1974). Explicit procedures for such constructions, and their substantiation, are provided.