Flipping a Coin by E-Mail


Each player secretly picks either

and then multiplies the chosen numbers together.

Then, each player sends the result (each a 300 digit number) to the other player via e-mail.

Notice that even with a very powerful computer, the receiving player can not factor the player's 300 digit number, nor even determine how many factors it has.

When both e-mails have been received, each player then announces to the other the factors which were multiplied to form the product. It is "easy" to check that the factors do indeed multiply to form the announced product, and that the factors are really prime (using a probabilitic primality test available in Maple or Mathematica, for example).


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