Post-quantum Research Articles

Quantum-safe global encryption policy

Abstract Every day, individuals use the Internet to communicate, gather information, and engage in commercial transactions. Encryption renders such activities secure and possible in the first place. While interest in encryption policy has fluctuated among policymakers for the past three decades, this paper argues for the need to promote strong encryption at a global level. The paper sheds light on the risks posed by quantum computing to national security, wherein breached encryption could compromise classified information, military intelligence, sensitive devices, and critical infrastructures. The argument for a worldwide encryption policy is further substantiated by the looming spectre of profound global power asymmetries. As the evolution of quantum technology remains concentrated within a select cohort of nations, those in possession of functional quantum computers could gain unprecedented advantages and exploit such technological supremacy. To buttress this assertion, this paper employs the logic of the ‘least trusted country problem’ to underscore the fragility of global security in the face of such imbalances. In response, this paper introduces a three-fold strategy designed to pave the path towards a quantum-secure future. The strategy encompasses the pivotal elements of post-quantum cryptography, quantum key distribution, and quantum random number generators. While acknowledging the challenges inherent in implementing these measures, including the projected decade-long timeline for establishing standardized solutions, the paper underscores the urgency of confronting the imminent quantum computing menace in a proactive manner. By adhering to these strategic imperatives, the global community stands poised to reinforce encryption practices against the potent capabilities that quantum computing wields. In so doing, the security and integrity of information exchange can be preserved in an ever more interconnected world.

Constrained Device Performance Benchmarking with the Implementation of Post-Quantum Cryptography

Advances in quantum computers may pose a significant threat to existing public-key encryption methods, which are crucial to the current infrastructure of cyber security. Both RSA and ECDSA, the two most widely used security algorithms today, may be (in principle) solved by the Shor algorithm in polynomial time due to its ability to efficiently solve the discrete logarithm problem, potentially making present infrastructures insecure against a quantum attack. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) reacted with the post-quantum cryptography (PQC) standardization process to develop and optimize a series of post-quantum algorithms (PQAs) based on difficult mathematical problems that are not susceptible to being solved by Shor’s algorithm. Whilst high-powered computers can run these PQAs efficiently, further work is needed to investigate and benchmark the performance of these algorithms on lower-powered (constrained) devices and the ease with which they may be integrated into existing protocols such as TLS. This paper provides quantitative benchmark and handshake performance data for the most recently selected PQAs from NIST, tested on a Raspberry Pi 4 device to simulate today’s IoT (Internet of Things) devices, and provides quantitative comparisons with previous benchmarking data on a range of constrained systems. CRYSTALS-Kyber and CRYSTALS-Dilithium are shown to be the most efficient PQAs in the key encapsulation and signature algorithms, respectively, with Falcon providing the optimal TLS handshake size.

PQCAIE: Post quantum cryptographic authentication scheme for IoT-based e-health systems

The increasing integration of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies in consumer electronics has revolutionized various sectors, including healthcare. This evolution has led to the development of IoT-enabled consumer health devices and systems, offering benefits such as enhanced remote health monitoring and more efficient health data management. However, these advancements also pose significant security challenges, especially regarding data privacy and secure access. A critical concern is the vulnerability of current cryptographic methods to potential future quantum computing capabilities. This paper focuses on addressing these challenges by exploring the implementation of Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) in IoT-based consumer health electronics. Specifically, it evaluates the application of PQC methods in conjunction with Transport Layer Security 1.3 (TLS 1.3) for robust authentication in these systems. The study analyzes the performance and security efficacy of these schemes, comparing them to existing cryptographic approaches. Additionally, it delves into the practical hurdles and prospective solutions related to the deployment of post-quantum cryptographic techniques in the context of consumer health electronics, paving the way for more secure and reliable healthcare technology in the era of advanced consumer electronics.

Secure and Scalable Internet of Things Model Using Post-Quantum MACsec

For the secure deployment of network platforms tailored for IoT devices, the encryption of data transmission is equally as crucial as the process of authentication. In this context, we introduce the Secure and Scalable IoT network (SSI) network platform, designed to accommodate a diverse range of IoT devices. It provides scalability and implements effective many-to-many and end-to-end encryption across extensive regions. With the emergence of quantum computing, secure public key exchange mechanisms have become important. Among the various post-quantum cryptography (PQC) algorithms assessed, Nth Degree Truncated Polynomial Ring Units (NTRUs) have emerged as an optimally suited PQC algorithm for IoT devices constrained by limited computational capabilities. We have integrated NTRUs with SSI as a lightweight PQC solution. Moreover, SSI-PQM (Post-Quantum MACsec) enhances the SSI’s initial authentication structure to minimize PQC-TLS session attempts and protect the SSI’s important configuration information. When applying TLS with PQC for secret key exchange purposes, it was verified that this approach ensures stable performance in IoT environments. Upon the implementation of our proposed SSI-PQM on Raspberry Pi 3B+ based IoT devices, SSI-PQM exhibited acceptable performance at security levels from 80 to 128 and achieved a minimum speed improvement of 161% over RSA at security levels above 160. It can be concluded that SSI-PQM stands out as an effective Zero Trust-based IoT network platform, demonstrating its viability and efficiency in safeguarding data transmission against potential quantum computing threats.

Challenges and opportunities on the horizon of post-quantum cryptography

Large quantum computers have the potential to break many cryptographic systems, e.g., Rivest–Shamir–Adleman, Diffie–Hellman key exchange, and the elliptical curve cryptosystem. The Department of Defense (DoD) is aware of this threat, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology is preparing a set of approved encryption and signature schemes that are not susceptible to these attacks by quantum computers, the so-called Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC). The task of substituting older encryption and signature schemes raises a number of questions, to which there are not yet clear answers. In this research, we investigate the transition to PQC on existing networks, explain the approved PQC schemes, describe the likely path to an adaptation of PQC, and offer forward guidance on challenges and threats that may be encountered in the process of transition to PQC. This paper discusses the impacts of the new PQC schemes on network performance and speculates on possible side-channel attacks on the new encryption scheme. This paper offers hardware/software solutions based on the Split-protocol.

Integer syndrome decoding in the presence of noise

Code-based cryptography received attention after the NIST started the post-quantum cryptography standardization process in 2016. A central NP-hard problem is the binary syndrome decoding problem, on which the security of many code-based cryptosystems lies. The best known methods to solve this problem all stem from the information-set decoding strategy, first introduced by Prange in 1962. A recent line of work considers augmented versions of this strategy, with hints typically provided by side-channel information. In this work, we consider the integer syndrome decoding problem, where the integer syndrome is available but might be noisy. We study how the performance of the decoder is affected by the noise. First we identify the noise model as being close to a centered in zero binomial distribution. Second we model the probability of success of the ISD-score decoder in presence of a binomial noise. Third, we demonstrate that with high probability our algorithm finds the solution as long as the noise parameter d is linear in t (the Hamming weight of the solution) and t is sub-linear in the code-length. We provide experimental results on cryptographic parameters for the BIKE and Classic McEliece cryptosystems, which are both candidates for the fourth round of the NIST standardization process.

Enhancing Blockchain Security and Efficiency through FPGA-Based Consensus Mechanisms and Post-Quantum Cryptography

Introduction: Blockchain technology has revolutionized data management and transaction recording, extending its application beyond cryptocurrencies to various sectors, including Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) Method: This distributed ledger technology offers a transparent, immutable, and secure transaction platform, reducing the risk of data tampering and increasing resistance to attacks. However, challenges such as performance, scalability, and security continue to exist; these challenges are particularly concerning consensus mechanisms like Proof of Work (PoW). Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) present a promising solution to enhance the efficiency and security of blockchain consensus mechanisms. Result: This study explores the implementation of blockchain in embedded systems using FPGAs and discusses the post-quantum cryptographic algorithms to ensure long-term protection. Conclusion: The research highlights the potential of FPGA-based implementations to revolutionize blockchain applications, emphasizing the need for continuous adaptation and vigilance to address evolving security threats, particularly those posed by quantum computing.

Module lattice based post quantum secure blockchain empowered vehicle to vehicle communication in the internet of vehicles

The importance of vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication is increasing due to high rate of accidents and advancements in information exchange system. The V2V communication facilitates vehicles to exchange real-time informations about their surrounding, such as nearby vehicle, pedestrian, and road hazard. These type of informations are very helpful to detect potential collision, warn driver of imminent danger, and take advanced measure to avoid accident. Both security and privacy of user participating in the vehicular networking system depends upon reliable data transmission system. The suggested approaches must have minimal processing complexity and be unaffected by latency problems due to the scalability of V2V connection. This paper contains module lattice based quantum safe blockchain empowered authentication framework for autonomous vehicle communication system. This framework uses blockchain that is always contains multiple nodes, then we need an aggregation technique to provide authenticity to the system. The proposed framework provides authenticity to the system based on two assumptions, (1) Module Learning With Error and (2) Module Short Integer Solution. The proposed framework is quantum safe, provides high latency and throughput.

Cryptographic primitives based on compact knapsack problem

The present paper builds upon prior research on an id scheme that utilizes a compact knapsack problem defined by a single equation. We introduce a three-move id scheme founded on a compact knapsack problem defined by an integer matrix. Through our analysis, we investigate the possible lattice-based attacks on this problem. Additionally, we present the corresponding digital signature gained through the Fiat–Shamir transform and demonstrate its security under ROM. These cryptographic primitives are potentially post quantum resistant.

A post-quantum secure PUF based cross-domain authentication mechanism for Internet of drones

With the increasing prevalence of drones, guaranteeing their authentication and secure communication has become paramount in drone networks to mitigate unauthorized access and malicious attacks. Cross-domain authentication is crucial in the context of the Internet of Drones (IoD) for safely verifying and establishing trust between diverse drones and their respective control stations, which may belong to different regions or organizations. Effectively accessing resources or services in another domain while maintaining security and efficiency poses a significant challenge. Conventional authentication mechanisms relying on challenging problems like discrete logarithm and integer factorization might not be sufficient to guarantee the security and effectiveness of drone-based systems in the post-quantum era. To address this, we propose a distributed post-quantum cryptography and Physical Unclonable Function (PUF) based cross-domain authentication protocol for IoD. Key contributions of this work include the elimination of secret key storage on drones, mutual authentication, emphasis on hardware security, incorporation of post-quantum security measures, efficient cross-domain authentication and resilience against cyber attacks such as eavesdropping, impersonation, replay attack, untraceability, and PUF-modeling attack. The performance of the proposed protocol is assessed utilizing metrics like processing time, communication cost and storage utilization. In operations associated to the blockchain ledger, variables such as latency, throughput, CPU utilization, and memory utilization are also examined. The protocol shows a reduced computation time and zero sensitive data storage in drone memory, despite a slightly higher communication cost that is manageable with 5G-enabled drones. Comparative analysis against existing solutions in the domain highlights the superior security of the proposed protocol, positioning it as a promising solution for the evolving quantum landscape.

ДОСЛІДЖЕННЯ АЛГОРИТМІВ ПОСТКВАНТОВОГО ЦИФРОВОГО ПІДПИСУ

The continuous development of quantum computing requires the development of cryptographic algorithms resistant to quantum cryptanalysis. Therefore, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is holding a competition to standardize algorithms in the post-quantum period, including Crystals-Dilithium, Falcon, and Sphincs+ for digital signatures. In order to determine the ways of development and ways to improve the existing methods of cryptographic protection and electronic digital signature (EDS), an urgent task arose to assess the effectiveness (stability and computational complexity) of existing EDS algorithms. In this paper, a comparative evaluation of EDS algorithms was carried out by key indicators. Research results show the disadvantages and advantages of each algorithm, taking into account the importance of context-specific use. The conclusions indicate that Dilithium has the lowest load on the system's computing resources, Falcon stands out for its signature verification speed, and Sphincs+ provides reliable security. The capabilities of existing cryptographic transformation algorithms based on elliptic curves do not meet the growing need of authentication algorithms resistance to quantum cryptanalysis, and the use of modern candidates for the post-quantum cryptography standard does not allow for a short-term transition to the usage of new cryptographic algorithms in information systems. The paper also points out the impossibility of simultaneous transition to potentially quantum cryptanalysis-resistant algorithms in existing information systems. The direction of further research is the development of new cryptoalgorithms and methods that will ensure the integrity and confidentiality of information during its transmission over unprotected channels in the transition period to the widespread use and implementation of post-quantum cryptography standards.

Design and Evaluation of Device Authentication and Secure Communication System with PQC for AIoT Environments

With the rapid development of Internet of Things (IoT) technology, the number of IoT users is growing year after year. IoT will become a part of our daily lives, so it is likely that the security of these devices will be an important issue in the future. Quantum computing is maturing, and the security threat associated with quantum computing will be faced in the transmissions of IoT devices, which mainly use wireless communication technologies. Therefore, to ensure the protection of transmitted data, a cryptographic algorithm that is efficient in defeating quantum computer attacks needs to be developed. In this paper, we propose a device authentication and secure communication system with post-quantum cryptography (PQC) for AIoT environments using the NTRU and Falcon signature mechanism, which can resist quantum computer attacks and be used in AIoT environments to effectively protect the confidentiality, integrity, and non-repudiation of transmitted data. We also used Raspberry Pi to simulate AIoT devices for implementation.

Lightweight ASIP Design for Lattice-Based Post-quantum Cryptography Algorithms

AbstractLattice-based cryptography (LBC) algorithms are considered suitable candidates for post-quantum cryptography (PQC), as they dominate the standardization process put forward by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Indeed, three of the four key encapsulation mechanism (KEM) algorithms in the third round of the process are based on computationally hard lattice problems. On the other hand, there is an urgent need for processor designs that can run PQC algorithms efficiently, especially for embedded systems. This study presents an application-specific instruction set processor (ASIP) design for the Kyber, Saber, and NewHope algorithms based on transport triggered architecture (TTA). Custom hardware accelerators are added to the baseline processor architecture for computation-intensive steps without applying any software optimization to the reference code. We compared FPGA and ASIC implementations of our design with the prominent RISC-V cores and instruction set extension studies in the literature. According to the results, the proposed design offers greater efficiency, better performance, and lower resource utilization than its competitors in most cases.

A lattice-based efficient certificateless public key encryption for big data security in clouds

With the advancement of technology and the development of digitization, big data has become an integral component of modern society. Due to the huge volume of big data, users generally upload data to the cloud for storage and computation. Because data in the cloud is beyond the control of users, it faces threats such as data security and personal privacy leakage. To address these concerns and achieve big data security and privacy protection in clouds, data encryption is crucial. Traditional public key encryption involves complex certificate management in a public key infrastructure (PKI). Although the identity-based encryption (IBE) scheme avoids the management of public key certificates, it has issues with key escrows and identity revocation. The certificateless public key encryption (CL-PKE) not only solves the key escrows problem in IBE, but also maintains its advantage of not requiring the use of certificate in PKI, making it suitable for the security protection of big data in clouds. However, most CL-PKE schemes are constructed based on large integer factorization and discrete logarithm problems, which cannot resist quantum computing attacks. Therefore, this paper proposes an efficient lattice-based CL-PKE scheme for big data security in clouds. In addition, the proposed scheme is extended to a lattice-based certificateless proxy re-encryption scheme, facilitating secure big data sharing in clouds. The proposed CL-PKE scheme can resist attacks from both internal and external adversaries, and has been proven to be IND-CPA secure under the learning with errors (LWE) assumption. Experiments have shown that the proposed CL-PKE scheme has lower computational and communication costs. The proposed lattice-based schemes can effectively provide post quantum security for the security and privacy protection of big data in clouds.

An Example of Parallel Merkle Tree Traversal: Post-Quantum Leighton-Micali Signature on the GPU

The hash-based signature (HBS) is the most conservative and time-consuming among many post-quantum cryptography (PQC) algorithms. Two HBSs, LMS and XMSS, are the only PQC algorithms standardised by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) now. Existing HBSs are designed based on serial Merkle tree traversal, which is not conducive to taking full advantage of the computing power of parallel architectures such as CPUs and GPUs. We propose a parallel Merkle tree traversal (PMTT), which is tested by implementing LMS on the GPU. This is the first work accelerating LMS on the GPU, which performs well even with over 10,000 cores. Considering different scenarios of algorithmic parallelism and data parallelism, we implement corresponding variants for PMTT. The design of PMTT for algorithmic parallelism mainly considers the execution efficiency of a single task, while that for data parallelism starts with the full utilisation of GPU performance. In addition, we are the first to design a CPU-GPU collaborative processing solution for traversal algorithms to reduce the communication overhead between CPU and GPU. For algorithmic parallelism, our implementation is still 4.48 × faster than the ideal time of the state-of-the-art traversal algorithm. For data parallelism, when the number of cores increases from 1 to 8192, the parallel efficiency is 78.39%. In comparison, our LMS implementation outperforms most existing LMS and XMSS implementations.

Learning with Errors: A Lattice-Based Keystone of Post-Quantum Cryptography

The swift advancement of quantum computing devices holds the potential to create robust machines that can tackle an extensive array of issues beyond the scope of conventional computers. Consequently, quantum computing machines create new risks at a velocity and scale never seen before, especially with regard to encryption. Lattice-based cryptography is regarded as post-quantum cryptography’s future and a competitor to a quantum computer attack. Thus, there are several advantages to lattice-based cryptographic protocols, including security, effectiveness, reduced energy usage and speed. In this work, we study the learning with errors (LWE) problem and the cryptosystems that are based on the LWE problem and, in addition, we present a new efficient variant of LWE cryptographic scheme.

Challenges and Future Trends of Cryptography in Internet of Things

The incorporation of cryptographic techniques is crucial for guaranteeing data privacy and security processed additionally sent inside IOT ecosystems, particularly as the IOT keeps growing. Examining problems including resource limitations, scalability, and the dynamic nature of IOT environments, this research paper explores the complex obstacles that cryptographic solutions confront considering the IOT. Lightweight cryptography, post-quantum cryptography, and blockchain integration are some of the new trends and future prospects in cryptographic research that are examined in this study in an effort to address these issues. This work offers a useful viewpoint for scholars, practitioners, and legislators engaged in the constantly changing field of cryptographic protocols inside the IOT framework by clarifying current problems and projecting future advancements. Keywords— Cryptography, Internet of Things (IOT), Security,Challenges

Post-quantum cryptography and the quantum future of cybersecurity

Post-quantum cryptography and the quantum future of cybersecurity

Fast polynomial multiplication using matrix multiplication accelerators with applications to NTRU on Apple M1/M3 SoCs

Efficient polynomial multiplication routines are critical to the performance of lattice-based post-quantum cryptography (PQC). As PQC standards only recently started to emerge, CPUs still lack specialized instructions to accelerate such routines. Meanwhile, deep learning has grown immeasurably in importance. Its workloads call for teraflops-level of processing power for linear algebra operations, mainly matrix multiplication. Computer architects have responded by introducing ISA extensions, coprocessors and special-purpose cores to accelerate such operations. In particular, Apple ships an undocumented matrix-multiplication coprocessor, AMX, in hundreds of millions of mobile phones, tablets and personal computers. Our work repurposes AMX to implement polynomial multiplication and applies it to the NTRU cryptosystem, setting new speed records on the Apple M1 and M3 systems-on-chip (SoCs): polynomial multiplication, key generation, encapsulation and decapsulation are sped up by 1.54 – 3.07 × , 1.08 – 1.33 × , 1.11 – 1.50 × and 1.20 – 1.98 × , respectively, over the previous state-of-the-art.

An Investigative Study on Variants of Post-Quantum RSA

As quantum computing advances, traditional cryptographic schemes such as RSA face increasing vulnerability to attacks. This investigative study delves into the realm of post-quantum cryptography, focusing specifically on variants of RSA designed to resist quantum attacks. Through a comprehensive review of existing literature and cryptographic protocols, we analyse the strengths and weaknesses of various post-quantum RSA variants, including lattice-based, code-based, and hash-based approaches. Additionally, we evaluate the computational efficiency and security guarantees of these variants, considering factors such as key size, encryption/decryption speed, and resistance to quantum algorithms. Our findings provide insights into the current state of post-quantum RSA, highlighting promising directions for further research and development in the quest for quantum-resistant cryptographic solutions. In the future robust variants of RSA, algorithms will help the stakeholders of the cryptosystems to instil faith in the security of the system in the face of challenges which is inadvertently posed by the attackers using advanced security attack vectors.