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The key-scheduling algorithm in the AES is the component responsible for selecting from the master key the sequence of round keys to be xor-ed to the partially encrypted state at each iteration. We consider here the group Γ generated by the action of the AES-128 key-scheduling operation, and we prove that the smallest group containing Γ and all the translations of the message space is primitive. As a consequence, we obtain that no linear partition of the message space can be invariant under its action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of the trapdoors that can be hidden in a block cipher is and has always been a high-interest topic in symmetric cryptography. In this paper we focus on Feistel-network-like ciphers in a classical long-key scenario and we investigate some conditions which make such a construction immune to the partition-based attack introduced recently by Bannier et al. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We introduce a new property for mixing layers which guarantees protection against algebraic attacks based on the imprimitivity of the group generated by the round functions. Mixing layers satisfying this property are called non-type-preserving. Our main result is to characterize such mixing layers by providing a list of necessary and sufficient conditions on the structure of their underlying binary matrices. Then we show how several families of linear maps are non-type-preserving, including the mixing layers of AES, GOST and PRESENT. Finally we prove that the group generated by the round functions of an SPN cipher with addition modulo 2n2n as key mixing function is primitive if its mixing layer satisfies this property. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Round functions used as building blocks for iterated block ciphers, both in the case of Substitution-Permutation Networks (SPN) and Feistel Networks (FN), are often obtained as the composition of different layers. The bijectivity of any encryption function is guaranteed by the use of invertible layers or by the Feistel structure. In this work a new family of ciphers, called wave ciphers, is introduced. In wave ciphers, round functions feature wave functions, which are vectorial Boolean functions obtained as the composition of non-invertible layers, where the confusion layer enlarges the message which returns to its original size after the diffusion layer is applied. Efficient decryption is guaranteed by the use of wave functions in FNs. It is shown how to avoid that the group generated by the round functions acts imprimitively, a serious flaw for the cipher. The primitivity is a consequence of a more general result, which reduce the problem of proving that a given FN generates a primitive group to proving that an SPN, directly related to the given FN, generates a primitive group. Finally, a concrete instance of real-world size wave cipher is proposed as an example, and its resistance against differential and linear cryptanalyses is also established. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We provide two sufficient conditions to guarantee that the round functions of a translation-based cipher generate a primitive group. Furthermore, under the same hypotheses, and assuming that a round of the cipher is strongly proper and consists of -bit S-Boxes, with or , we prove that such a group is the alternating group. As an immediate consequence, we deduce that the round functions of some lightweight translation-based ciphers, such as the PRESENT cipher, generate the alternating group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A block cipher can be easily broken if its encryption functions can be seen as linear maps on a small vector space. Even more so, if its round functions can be seen as linear maps on a small vector space. We show that this cannot happen for the AES. More precisely, we prove that if the AES round transformations can be embedded into a linear cipher acting on a vector space, then this space is huge-dimensional and so this embedding is infeasible in practice. We present two elementary proofs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]