Cipher security summary

Last updated

This article summarizes publicly known attacks against block ciphers and stream ciphers. Note that there are perhaps attacks that are not publicly known, and not all entries may be up to date.

Contents

Table color key

  No known successful attacks — attack only breaks a reduced version of the cipher
  Theoretical break — attack breaks all rounds and has lower complexity than security claim
  Attack demonstrated in practice

Best attack

This column lists the complexity of the attack:

Common ciphers

Key or plaintext recovery attacks

Attacks that lead to disclosure of the key or plaintext.

CipherSecurity claimBest attackPublish dateComment
AES128 2128 2126.1 time, 288 data, 28 memory 2011-08-17Independent biclique attack. [1]
AES1922192 2189.7 time, 280 data, 28 memory
AES2562256 2254.4 time, 240 data, 28 memory
Blowfish Up to 24484 of 16 rounds; 64-bit block is vulnerable to SWEET32 attack.2016 Differential cryptanalysis. [2] Author of Blowfish (Bruce Schneier) recommends using Twofish instead. [3] SWEET32 attack demonstrated birthday attacks to recover plaintext with its 64-bit block size, vulnerable to protocols such as TLS, SSH, IPsec, and OpenVPN, without attacking the cipher itself. [4]
Twofish 2128 – 22566 of 16 rounds (2256 time)1999-10-05 Impossible differential attack. [5]
Serpent-128212810 of 32 rounds (289 time, 2118 data)2002-02-04 Linear cryptanalysis. [6]
Serpent-192219211 of 32 rounds (2187 time, 2118 data)
Serpent-2562256
DES 256239 – 243 time, 243 known plaintexts 2001 Linear cryptanalysis. [7] In addition, broken by brute force in 256 time, no later than 1998-07-17, see EFF DES cracker. [8] Cracking hardware is available for purchase since 2006. [9]
Triple DES 21682113 time, 232 data, 288 memory; 64-bit block is vulnerable to SWEET32 attack.2016Extension of the meet-in-the-middle attack. Time complexity is 2113 steps, but along with proposed techniques, it is estimated to be equivalent to 290 single DES encryption steps. The paper also proposes other time–memory tradeoffs. [10] SWEET32 attack demonstrated birthday attacks to recover plaintext with its 64-bit block size, vulnerable to protocols such as TLS, SSH, IPsec, and OpenVPN. [4]
KASUMI 2128232 time, 226 data, 230 memory, 4 related keys2010-01-10The cipher used in 3G cell phone networks. This attack takes less than two hours on a single PC, but isn't applicable to 3G due to known plaintext and related key requirements. [11]
RC4 Up to 22048220 time, 216.4 related keys(95% success probability)2007Commonly known as PTW attack, it can break WEP encryption in Wi-Fi on an ordinary computer in negligible time. [12] This is an improvement of the original Fluhrer, Mantin and Shamir attack published in 2001. [13]

Distinguishing attacks

Attacks that allow distinguishing ciphertext from random data.

CipherSecurity claimBest attackPublish dateComment
RC4 up to 22048?? time, 230.6 bytes data (90% probability)2000Paper. [14]

Less common ciphers

Key recovery attacks

Attacks that lead to disclosure of the key.

CipherSecurity claimBest attackPublish dateComment
CAST (not CAST-128)264248 time, 217 chosen plaintexts1997-11-11 Related-key attack. [15]
CAST-128 21286 of 16 rounds (288.51 time, 253.96 data)2009-08-23 Known-plaintext linear cryptanalysis. [16]
CAST-256 225624 of 48 rounds (2156.2 time, 2124.1 data)
IDEA 2128 2126.1 time2012-04-15Narrow-biclique attack. [17]
MISTY1 2128 269.5 time, 264 chosen plaintexts 2015-07-30 Chosen-ciphertext, integral cryptanalysis, [18] an improvement over a previous chosen-plaintext attack. [19]
RC2 264 – 2128Unknown[ clarification needed ] time, 234 chosen plaintexts1997-11-11Related-key attack. [15]
RC5 2128Un­known
SEED 2128Un­known
Skipjack 280280ECRYPT II recommendations note that, as of 2012, 80 bit ciphers provide only "Very short-term protection against agencies". [20] NIST recommends not to use Skipjack after 2010. [21]
TEA 2128 232 time, 223 chosen plaintexts 1997-11-11Related-key attack. [15]
XTEA 2128Un­known
XXTEA 2128259 chosen plaintexts2010-05-04 Chosen-plaintext, differential cryptanalysis. [22]

Distinguishing attacks

Attacks that allow distinguishing ciphertext from random data.

CipherSecurity claimBest attackPublish dateComment
CAST-256 2256 28 of 48 rounds (2246.9 time, 268 memory, 298.8 data) 2012-12-04Multidimensional zero-correlation cryptanalysis. [23]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Advanced Encryption Standard</span> Standard for the encryption of electronic data

The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), also known by its original name Rijndael, is a specification for the encryption of electronic data established by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in 2001.

In cryptography, a block cipher is a deterministic algorithm that operates on fixed-length groups of bits, called blocks. Block ciphers are the elementary building blocks of many cryptographic protocols. They are ubiquitous in the storage and exchange of data, where such data is secured and authenticated via encryption.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Data Encryption Standard</span> Early unclassified symmetric-key block cipher

The Data Encryption Standard is a symmetric-key algorithm for the encryption of digital data. Although its short key length of 56 bits makes it too insecure for modern applications, it has been highly influential in the advancement of cryptography.

Differential cryptanalysis is a general form of cryptanalysis applicable primarily to block ciphers, but also to stream ciphers and cryptographic hash functions. In the broadest sense, it is the study of how differences in information input can affect the resultant difference at the output. In the case of a block cipher, it refers to a set of techniques for tracing differences through the network of transformation, discovering where the cipher exhibits non-random behavior, and exploiting such properties to recover the secret key.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Data Encryption Algorithm</span> Symmetric-key block cipher

In cryptography, the International Data Encryption Algorithm (IDEA), originally called Improved Proposed Encryption Standard (IPES), is a symmetric-key block cipher designed by James Massey of ETH Zurich and Xuejia Lai and was first described in 1991. The algorithm was intended as a replacement for the Data Encryption Standard (DES). IDEA is a minor revision of an earlier cipher, the Proposed Encryption Standard (PES).

In cryptography, RC4 is a stream cipher. While it is remarkable for its simplicity and speed in software, multiple vulnerabilities have been discovered in RC4, rendering it insecure. It is especially vulnerable when the beginning of the output keystream is not discarded, or when nonrandom or related keys are used. Particularly problematic uses of RC4 have led to very insecure protocols such as WEP.

Articles related to cryptography include:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eli Biham</span> Israeli cryptographer and cryptanalyst (born 1960)

Eli Biham is an Israeli cryptographer and cryptanalyst who is a professor at the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology Computer Science department. From 2008 to 2013, Biham was the dean of the Technion Computer Science department, after serving for two years as chief of CS graduate school. Biham invented (publicly) differential cryptanalysis, for which he received his Ph.D., while working under Adi Shamir. It had been invented before by a team at IBM during their Data Encryption Standard work; the National Security Agency told IBM to keep the discovery secret.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GOST (block cipher)</span> Soviet/Russian national standard block cipher

The GOST block cipher (Magma), defined in the standard GOST 28147-89, is a Soviet and Russian government standard symmetric key block cipher with a block size of 64 bits. The original standard, published in 1989, did not give the cipher any name, but the most recent revision of the standard, GOST R 34.12-2015, specifies that it may be referred to as Magma. The GOST hash function is based on this cipher. The new standard also specifies a new 128-bit block cipher called Kuznyechik.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tiny Encryption Algorithm</span> Block cipher

In cryptography, the Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA) is a block cipher notable for its simplicity of description and implementation, typically a few lines of code. It was designed by David Wheeler and Roger Needham of the Cambridge Computer Laboratory; it was first presented at the Fast Software Encryption workshop in Leuven in 1994, and first published in the proceedings of that workshop.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DES-X</span> Block cipher

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In cryptography, the boomerang attack is a method for the cryptanalysis of block ciphers based on differential cryptanalysis. The attack was published in 1999 by David Wagner, who used it to break the COCONUT98 cipher.

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In cryptography, a round or round function is a basic transformation that is repeated (iterated) multiple times inside the algorithm. Splitting a large algorithmic function into rounds simplifies both implementation and cryptanalysis.

References

  1. ↑ Vincent Rijmen (1997). "Cryptanalysis and Design of Iterated Block Ciphers". Ph.D. Thesis.
  2. ↑ Dahna McConnachie (2007-12-27). "Bruce Almighty: Schneier preaches security to Linux faithful". Computerworld. Archived from the original on 2012-06-03. Retrieved 2014-02-13.
  3. 1 2 Karthikeyan Bhargavan, Gaëtan Leurent (August 2016). "On the Practical (In-)Security of 64-bit Block Ciphers — Collision Attacks on HTTP over TLS and OpenVPN". ACM CCS 2016.
  4. ↑ Niels Ferguson (1999-10-05). "Impossible Differentials in Twofish". Schneier.
  5. ↑ Eli Biham; Orr Dunkelman; Nathan Keller (2002-02-04). Linear Cryptanalysis of Reduced Round Serpent. FSE 2002. doi: 10.1007/3-540-45473-X_2 .
  6. ↑ Junod, Pascal (2001). On the Complexity of Matsui's Attack. Selected Areas in Cryptography. pp. 199–211. Archived from the original on 2009-05-27.
  7. ↑ "DES Cracker Project". EFF. Archived from the original on May 7, 2017. Retrieved August 26, 2015. On Wednesday, July 17, 1998 the EFF DES Cracker, which was built for less than $250,000, easily won RSA Laboratory's "DES Challenge II" contest and a $10,000 cash prize.
  8. ↑ "COPACOBANA – Special-Purpose Hardware for Code-Breaking".
  9. ↑ Stefan Lucks (1998-03-23). "Attacking Triple Encryption". Fast Software Encryption. Lecture Notes in Computer Science. Vol. 1372. Springer. pp. 239–253. doi: 10.1007/3-540-69710-1_16 . ISBN   978-3-540-64265-7.
  10. ↑ Orr Dunkelman; Nathan Keller; Adi Shamir (2010-01-10). "A Practical-Time Attack on the A5/3 Cryptosystem Used in Third Generation GSM Telephony". Cryptology ePrint Archive.
  11. ↑ Erik Tews; Ralf-Philipp Weinmann; Andrei Pyshkin (2007). Breaking 104 Bit WEP in Less Than 60 Seconds. WISA 2007.
  12. ↑ Scott Fluhrer; Itsik Mantin; Adi Shamir (2001-12-20). Weaknesses in the Key Scheduling Algorithm of RC4 (PDF). Selected Areas in Cryptography 2001.
  13. ↑ Scott R. Fluhrer; David A. McGrew. Statistical Analysis of the Alleged RC4 Keystream Generator (PDF). FSE 2000. pp. 19–30. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-05-02.
  14. 1 2 3 John Kelsey; Bruce Schneier; David Wagner (1997-11-11). "Related-key cryptanalysis of 3-WAY, Biham-DES, CAST, DES-X NewDES, RC2, and TEA". In Yongfei Han; Tatsuaki Okamoto; Sihan Quing (eds.). Information and Communications Security: First International Conference. Vol. 1334. Springer. pp. 233–246. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.35.8112 . doi:10.1007/BFb0028479. ISBN   978-3-540-63696-0.
  15. ↑ Meiqin Wang; Xiaoyun Wang; Changhui Hu (2009-08-23). "New Linear Cryptanalytic Results of Reduced-Round of CAST-128 and CAST-256". Selected Areas in Cryptography. Lecture Notes in Computer Science. Vol. 5381. pp. 429–441. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-04159-4_28. ISBN   978-3-642-04158-7. S2CID   35612393.
  16. ↑ Achiya Bar-On (2015-07-30). "A 270 Attack on the Full MISTY1". Cryptology ePrint Archive.
  17. ↑ Yosuke Todo (2015-07-06). Integral Cryptanalysis on Full MISTY1. CRYPTO 2015.
  18. ↑ "ECRYPT II Yearly Report on Algorithms and Keysizes (2011-2012)" (PDF). CORDIS . 30 September 2012. D.SPA.20 Rev. 1.0, ICT-2007-216676 ECRYPT II.
  19. ↑ Transitions: Recommendation for Transitioning the Use of Cryptographic Algorithms and Key Lengths, NIST
  20. ↑ Elias Yarrkov (2010-05-04). "Cryptanalysis of XXTEA". Cryptology ePrint Archive.
  21. ↑ Andrey Bogdanov; Gregor Leander; Kaisa Nyberg; Meiqin Wang (2012-12-04). "Integral and multidimensional linear distinguishers with correlation zero" (PDF). Advances in Cryptology – ASIACRYPT 2012: 18th International Conference on the Theory and Application of Cryptology and Information Security. Vol. 7658. Springer. pp. 244–261. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-34961-4. ISBN   978-3-642-34960-7. S2CID   26601027.
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