Masking

Abstract

The goal of every countermeasure is to make the power consumption of a cryptographic device independent of the intermediate values of the cryptographic algorithm. Masking achieves this by randomizing the intermediate values that are processed by the cryptographic device. An advantage of this approach is that it can be implemented at the algorithm level without changing the power consumption characteristics of the cryptographic device. In other words, masking allows making the power consumption independent of the intermediate values, even if the device has a data-dependent power consumption. Masking is one of the countermeasures that has been extensively discussed in the scientific community. Numerous articles have been published that explain different types of masking schemes. Even security proofs have been delivered for some of the schemes. Recently, masking has also been applied to the cell level.