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Advances in quantum computing have urged the need for cryptographic algorithms that are low-power, low-energy, and secure against attacks that can be potentially enabled. For this post-quantum age, different solutions have been studied. Code-based cryptography is one feasible solution whose hardware architectures have become the focus of research in the NIST standardization process and has been advanced to the final round (to be concluded by 2022–2024). Nevertheless, although these constructions, e.g., McEliece and Niederreiter public key cryptography, have strong error correction properties, previous studies have proved the vulnerability of their hardware implementations against faults product of the environment and intentional faults, i.e., differential fault analysis. It is previously shown that depending on the codes used, i.e., classical or reduced (using either quasi-dyadic Goppa codes or quasi-cyclic alternant codes), flaws in error detection could be observed. In this work, efficient fault detection constructions are proposed for the first time to account for such shortcomings. Such schemes are based on regular parity, interleaved parity, and two different cyclic redundancy checks (CRC), i.e., CRC-2 and CRC-8. Without losing the generality, we experiment on the McEliece variant, noting that the presented schemes can be used for other code-based cryptosystems. We perform error detection capability assessments and implementations on field-programmable gate array Kintex-7 device xc7k70tfbv676-1 to verify the practicality of the presented approaches. To demonstrate the appropriateness for constrained embedded systems, the performance degradation and overheads of the presented schemes are assessed.

This survey is the first work on the current standard for lightweight cryptography, standardized in 2023 and used for security of embedded systems. Security issues as well as implementations and side-channel attacks for this lightweight standard by NIST is discussed.

Binary extension finite fields ${\mathrm{ GF}}(2^{m})$ have received prominent attention in the literature due to their application in many modern public-key cryptosystems and error-correcting codes. In particular, the inversion over ${\mathrm{ GF}}(2^{m})$ is crucial for current and postquantum cryptographic applications. Schemes such as Fermat’s little theorem (FLT) and the Itoh–Tsujii algorithm (ITA) have been studied to achieve better performance; however, this arithmetic operation is a complex, expensive, and time-consuming task that may require thousands of gates, increasing its vulnerability chance to natural defects. In this work, we propose efficient hardware architectures based on cyclic redundancy check (CRC) as error detection schemes for state-of-the-art finite field inversion over ${\mathrm{ GF}}(2^{m})$ for a polynomial basis. To verify the derivations of the formulations, software implementations are performed. Likewise, hardware implementations of the original finite field inversions with the proposed error detection schemes are performed over Xilinx field-programmable gate array (FPGA) verifying that the proposed schemes achieve high error coverage with acceptable overhead.

Code-based cryptography based on binary Goppa codes is a promising solution for thwarting attacks based on quantum computers. The McEliece cryptosystem is a code-based public-key cryptosystem which is believed to be resistant against quantum attacks. In fact, it is successfully advanced to the second round of the post-quantum cryptography standardization competition early 2019. Due to its very large key size, different variants of binary Goppa codes have been proposed. Nevertheless, research has shown that such codes can be thwarted through the injection of faults, causing erroneous outputs. In this work, we present countermeasures for the implementation of different composite field arithmetic units used in the McEliece cryptosystem. The proposed architectures use overhead-aware and tailored signatures. We apply these error detection signatures to the McEliece cryptosystem and perform field-programmable gate array (FPGA) implementations to show the feasibility of adopting the proposed schemes. We benchmark the overhead and performance degradation of the proposed approaches and show their suitability for constrained embedded systems.

Finite-field multiplication has received prominent attention in the literature with applications in cryptography and error-detecting codes. For many cryptographic algorithms, this arithmetic operation is a complex, costly, and time-consuming task that may require millions of gates. In this work, we propose efficient hardware architectures based on cyclic redundancy check (CRC) as error-detection schemes for postquantum cryptography (PQC) with case studies for the Luov cryptographic algorithm. Luov was submitted for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) PQC standardization competition and was advanced to the second round. The CRC polynomials selected are in-line with the required error-detection capabilities and with the field sizes as well. We have developed verification codes through which software implementations of the proposed schemes are performed to verify the derivations of the formulations. Additionally, hardware implementations of the original multipliers with the proposed error-detection schemes are performed over a Xilinx field-programmable gate array (FPGA), verifying that the proposed schemes achieve high error coverage with acceptable overhead.