A system and method are provided for mitigating key-exhaustion attacks in a key exchange protocol. The method includes computationally confirming an exchange of key bits has provided fresh shared key material before information theoretically confirming the exchange of key bits has provided fresh shared key material, while maintaining synchronization between messaging parties. In one implementation, maintaining synchronization includes updating keys in between each post-processing message session and managing a local state of each messaging party in the key exchange protocol prior to sending a next post-processing message. In another implementation, maintaining synchronization includes hiding a message containing the information theoretic authenticator by executing a decoy authentication process, prior to using an information theoretical key.