On the Cryptanalysis of Public-Key Cryptography

Nowadays, the most popular public-key cryptosystems are based on either the integer factorization or the discrete logarithm problem. The feasibility of solving these mathematical problems in practice is studied and techniques are presented to speed-up the underlying arithmetic on parallel architectures. The fastest known approach to solve the discrete logarithm problem in groups of elliptic curves over finite fields is the Pollard rho method. The negation map can be used to speed up this calculation by a factor √2. It is well known that the random walks used by Pollard rho when combined with the negation map get trapped in fruitless cycles. We show that previously published approaches to deal with this problem are plagued by recurring cycles, and we propose effective alternative countermeasures. Furthermore, fast modular arithmetic is introduced which can take advantage of prime moduli of a special form using efficient "sloppy reduction." The effectiveness of these techniques is demonstrated by solving a 112-bit elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem using a cluster of PlayStation 3 game consoles: breaking a public-key standard and setting a new world record. The elliptic curve method (ECM) for integer factorization is the asymptotically fastest method to find relatively small factors of large integers. From a cryptanalytic point of view the performance of ECM gives information about secure parameter choices of some cryptographic protocols. We optimize ECM by proposing carry-free arithmetic modulo Mersenne numbers (numbers of the form 2M – 1) especially suitable for parallel architectures. Our implementation of these techniques on a cluster of PlayStation 3 game consoles set a new record by finding a 241-bit prime factor of 21181 – 1. A normal form for elliptic curves introduced by Edwards results in the fastest elliptic curve arithmetic in practice. Techniques to reduce the temporary storage and enhance the performance even further in the setting of ECM are presented. Our results enable one to run ECM efficiently on resource-constrained platforms such as graphics processing units.

On the Analysis of Public-Key Cryptologic Algorithms

Andrea Miele

The RSA cryptosystem introduced in 1977 by Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir and Len Adleman is the most commonly deployed public-key cryptosystem. Elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) introduced in the mid 80's by Neal Koblitz and Victor Miller is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to RSA offering competitive performance due the use of smaller key sizes. Most recently hyperelliptic curve cryptography (HECC) has been demonstrated to have comparable and in some cases better performance than ECC. The security of RSA relies on the integer factorization problem whereas the security of (H)ECC is based on the (hyper)elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem ((H)ECDLP). In this thesis the practical performance of the best methods to solve these problems is analyzed and a method to generate secure ephemeral ECC parameters is presented. The best publicly known algorithm to solve the integer factorization problem is the number field sieve (NFS). Its most time consuming step is the relation collection step. We investigate the use of graphics processing units (GPUs) as accelerators for this step. In this context, methods to efficiently implement modular arithmetic and several factoring algorithms on GPUs are presented and their performance is analyzed in practice. In conclusion, it is shown that integrating state-of-the-art NFS software packages with our GPU software can lead to a speed-up of 50%. In the case of elliptic and hyperelliptic curves for cryptographic use, the best published method to solve the (H)ECDLP is the Pollard rho algorithm. This method can be made faster using classes of equivalence induced by curve automorphisms like the negation map. We present a practical analysis of their use to speed up Pollard rho for elliptic curves and genus 2 hyperelliptic curves defined over prime fields. As a case study, 4 curves at the 128-bit theoretical security level are analyzed in our software framework for Pollard rho to estimate their practical security level. In addition, we present a novel many-core architecture to solve the ECDLP using the Pollard rho algorithm with the negation map on FPGAs. This architecture is used to estimate the cost of solving the Certicom ECCp-131 challenge with a cluster of FPGAs. Our design achieves a speed-up factor of about 4 compared to the state-of-the-art. Finally, we present an efficient method to generate unique, secure and unpredictable ephemeral ECC parameters to be shared by a pair of authenticated users for a single communication. It provides an alternative to the customary use of fixed ECC parameters obtained from publicly available standards designed by untrusted third parties. The effectiveness of our method is demonstrated with a portable implementation for regular PCs and Android smartphones. On a Samsung Galaxy S4 smartphone our implementation generates unique 128-bit secure ECC parameters in 50 milliseconds on average.

EPFL2015

High-Performance Modular Multiplication on the Cell Processor

Joppe Willem Bos

This paper presents software implementation speed records for modular multiplication arithmetic on the synergistic processing elements of the Cell broadband engine (Cell) architecture. The focus is on moduli which are of special interest in elliptic curve cryptography, that is, moduli of bit-lengths ranging from 192- to 521-bit. Finite field arithmetic using primes which allow particularly fast reduction is compared to Montgomery multiplication. The special primes considered are the five recommended NIST primes, as specified in the FIPS 186-3 standard, and the prime used in the elliptic curve curve25519. While presented and benchmarked on the Cell architecture, the proposed techniques to efficiently implement the modular multiplication algorithms are suited to run on any architecture which is able to compute multiple computations concurrently; e.g. graphics processing units.

Springer-Verlag New York, Ms Ingrid Cunningham, 175 Fifth Ave, New York, Ny 10010 Usa2010

High-Performance Modular Multiplication on the Cell Processor

Joppe Willem Bos

Springer Berlin Heidelberg2010

On the Analysis of Public-Key Cryptologic Algorithms

Andrea Miele

EPFL2015