Linear Cryptanalysis: The Idea

Abstract

After differential cryptanalysis, linear cryptanalysis provides the most important general technique for analysing a block cipher. Generally speaking it tends to be far less successful than differential cryptanalysis, the most prominent exception to this rule of thumb being DES; see Chap. 2. It is an important technique and has one very specific advantage over differential cryptanalysis, namely that the cryptanalysis requires only known plaintext rather than chosen plaintext.