The birthday paradox: why 23 people are enough to share a birthday
The birthday attack: how a forger uses the birthday paradox to fake a signature
When your computer puts a digital signature on a file, it signs a short fingerprint of the file, not the file itself. A forger cannot copy your signature. Can he still make you sign the wrong file?
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Rono signs a contract online with a bus company, for next summer's buses. His computer does not sign the whole file. It makes a short fingerprint of the file, a number, and signs that. This fingerprint is called a hash.
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Change one comma in the file, and the hash comes out completely different. So if someone changes a signed file, the signature no longer fits it.
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