cryptography Cryptography, or cryptology (from grc, , translit=kryptós "hidden, secret"; and ''graphein'', "to write", or ''-logia'', "study", respectively), is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of adver ...

, Hierocrypt-L1 and Hierocrypt-3 are block ciphers created by

Toshiba , commonly known as Toshiba and stylized as TOSHIBA, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, ...

in 2000. They were submitted to the

NESSIE NESSIE (New European Schemes for Signatures, Integrity and Encryption) was a European research project funded from 2000 to 2003 to identify secure cryptographic primitives. The project was comparable to the NIST AES process and the Japanese Gov ...

project, but were not selected. Both algorithms were among the cryptographic techniques recommended for Japanese government use by

CRYPTREC CRYPTREC is the Cryptography Research and Evaluation Committees set up by the Japanese Government to evaluate and recommend cryptographic techniques for government and industrial use. It is comparable in many respects to the European Union's NESSIE ...

in 2003, however, both have been dropped to "candidate" by CRYPTREC revision in 2013. The Hierocrypt ciphers are very similar, differing mainly in block size: 64 bits for Hierocrypt-L1, 128 bits for Hierocrypt-3. Hierocrypt-L1's

key size In cryptography, key size, key length, or key space refer to the number of bits in a key used by a cryptographic algorithm (such as a cipher). Key length defines the upper-bound on an algorithm's security (i.e. a logarithmic measure of the faste ...

is 128 bits, while Hierocrypt-3 can use keys of 128, 192, or 256 bits. The number of rounds of encryption also varies: Hierocrypt-L1 uses 6.5 rounds, and Hierocrypt-3 uses 6.5, 7.5, or 8.5, depending on the key size. The Hierocrypt ciphers use a nested substitution–permutation network (SPN) structure. Each round consists of parallel applications of a transformation called the ''XS-box'', followed by a linear

diffusion Diffusion is the net movement of anything (for example, atoms, ions, molecules, energy) generally from a region of higher concentration to a region of lower concentration. Diffusion is driven by a gradient in Gibbs free energy or chemica ...

operation. The final half-round replaces the diffusion with a simple post-whitening. The XS-box, which is shared by the two algorithms, is itself an SPN, consisting of a subkey XOR, an

S-box In cryptography, an S-box (substitution-box) is a basic component of symmetric key algorithms which performs substitution. In block ciphers, they are typically used to obscure the relationship between the key and the ciphertext, thus ensuring Shan ...

lookup, a linear diffusion, another subkey XOR, and another S-box lookup. The diffusion operations use two MDS matrices, and there is a single 8×8-bit S-box. The key schedule uses the binary expansions of the square roots of some small integers as a source of "

nothing up my sleeve number In cryptography, nothing-up-my-sleeve numbers are any numbers which, by their construction, are above suspicion of hidden properties. They are used in creating cryptographic functions such as hashes and ciphers. These algorithms often need rand ...

s". No

analysis Analysis ( : analyses) is the process of breaking a complex topic or substance into smaller parts in order to gain a better understanding of it. The technique has been applied in the study of mathematics and logic since before Aristotle (3 ...

of the full ciphers has been announced, but certain weaknesses were discovered in the Hierocrypt key schedule, linear relationships between the master key and some subkeys. There has also been some success applying

integral cryptanalysis In cryptography, integral cryptanalysis is a cryptanalytic attack that is particularly applicable to block ciphers based on substitution–permutation networks. It was originally designed by Lars Knudsen as a dedicated attack against Square, so ...

to reduced-round Hierocrypt variants; attacks faster than exhaustive search have been found for 3.5 rounds of each cipher.

References

External links

256bit Ciphers - HIEROCRYPT Reference implementation and derived code
{{Cryptography navbox , block Block ciphers