Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2015/ii/paper-4/9h/iii/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 ii Paper 4 9H iii Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-06
False. The Carmichael number supplies a counterexample. For every coprime to , the Fermat little theorem gives modulo each of these primes, since all divide . The Chinese remainder theorem then gives . Thus the proposed Fermat primality test can fail to detect a composite for every coprime base.
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