Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

International Conference on Cryptology in Africa

AFRICACRYPT 2013: Progress in Cryptology – AFRICACRYPT 2013 pp 156–172Cite as

NaCl on 8-Bit AVR Microcontrollers

  • Conference paper

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 7918))

Abstract

This paper presents first results of the Networking and Cryptography library (NaCl) on the 8-bit AVR family of microcontrollers. We show that NaCl, which has so far been optimized mainly for different desktop and server platforms, is feasible on resource-constrained devices while being very fast and memory efficient. Our implementation shows that encryption using Salsa20 requires 268 cycles/byte, authentication using Poly1305 needs 195 cycles/byte, a Curve25519 scalar multiplication needs 22 791 579 cycles, signing of data using Ed25519 needs 23 216 241 cycles, and verification can be done within 32 634 713 cycles. All implemented primitives provide at least 128-bit security, run in constant time, do not use secret-data-dependent branch conditions, and are open to the public domain (no usage restrictions).

This work was supported by the Austrian Science Found (FWF) under the grant number TRP251-N23. Part of this work was done while Peter Schwabe was employed by the Research Center for Information Technology Innovation, Academia Sinica, Taiwan. Permanent ID of this document: cd4aad485407c33ece17e509622eb554. Date: April 1, 2013

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Barrett, P.: Implementing the Rivest Shamir and Adleman Public Key Encryption Algorithm on a Standard Digital Signal Processor. In: Odlyzko, A.M. (ed.) CRYPTO 1986. LNCS, vol. 263, pp. 311–323. Springer, Heidelberg (1987)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  2. Bernstein, D.J.: Curve25519: New Diffie-Hellman Speed Records. In: Yung, M., Dodis, Y., Kiayias, A., Malkin, T. (eds.) PKC 2006. LNCS, vol. 3958, pp. 207–228. Springer, Heidelberg (2006), http://cr.yp.to/papers.html#curve25519

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  3. Bernstein, D.J.: The Salsa20 family of stream ciphers. In: Robshaw, M., Billet, O. (eds.) New Stream Cipher Designs. LNCS, vol. 4986, pp. 84–97. Springer, Heidelberg (2008), http://cr.yp.to/papers.html#salsafamily

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  4. Bernstein, D.J., Lange, T., Schwabe, P.: The Security Impact of a New Cryptographic Library. In: Hevia, A., Neven, G. (eds.) LATINCRYPT 2012. LNCS, vol. 7533, pp. 159–176. Springer, Heidelberg (2012), http://cryptojedi.org/papers/#coolnacl

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  5. Bernstein, D.J.: The Poly1305-AES Message-Authentication Code. In: Gilbert, H., Handschuh, H. (eds.) FSE 2005. LNCS, vol. 3557, pp. 32–49. Springer, Heidelberg (2005), http://cr.yp.to/papers.html#poly1305

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  6. Bernstein, D.J., Birkner, P., Joye, M., Lange, T., Peters, C.: Twisted Edwards Curves. In: Vaudenay, S. (ed.) AFRICACRYPT 2008. LNCS, vol. 5023, pp. 389–405. Springer, Heidelberg (2008), http://cr.yp.to/papers.html#twisted

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  7. Bernstein, D.J., Duif, N., Lange, T., Schwabe, P., Yang, B.-Y.: High-speed high-security signatures. In: Preneel, B., Takagi, T. (eds.) CHES 2011. LNCS, vol. 6917, pp. 124–142. Springer, Heidelberg (2011); see also full version [8]

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  8. Bernstein, D.J., Duif, N., Lange, T., Schwabe, P., Yang, B.-Y.: High-speed high-security signatures. Journal of Cryptographic Engineering 2(2), 77–89 (2012) see also short version [7], http://cryptojedi.org/papers/#ed25519

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Bernstein, D.J., Lange, T.: eBACS: ECRYPT benchmarking of cryptographic systems, http://bench.cr.yp.to (accessed January 31, 2013)

  10. Bernstein, D.J., Schwabe, P.: NEON crypto. In: Prouff, E., Schaumont, P. (eds.) CHES 2012. LNCS, vol. 7428, pp. 320–339. Springer, Heidelberg (2012), http://cryptojedi.org/papers/#neoncrypto

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  11. Chu, D., Großschädl, J., Liu, Z.: Twisted Edwards-Form Elliptic Curve Cryptography for 8-bit AVR-based Sensor Nodes. Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2012/730 (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  12. European Network of Excellence in Cryptology II, http://www.ecrypt.eu.org/index.html (accessed January 18, 2013)

  13. Efton. 8051 and AVR Cryptolibrary, http://www.efton.sk/crypt/index.htm

  14. Eisenbarth, T., Kumar, S., Paar, C., Poschmann, A., Uhsadel, L.: A Survey of Lightweight-Cryptography Implementations. IEEE Design & Test of Computers - Design and Test of ICs for Secure Embedded Computing 24(6), 522–533 (2007) ISSN 0740-7475

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Das Labor e.V. AVR-Crypto-Lib, http://www.das-labor.org/wiki/AVR-Crypto-Lib/en

  16. Gura, N., Patel, A., Wander, A., Eberle, H., Shantz, S.C.: Comparing Elliptic Curve Cryptography and RSA on 8-bit CPUs. In: Joye, M., Quisquater, J.-J. (eds.) CHES 2004. LNCS, vol. 3156, pp. 119–132. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  17. Hisil, H., Wong, K.K.-H., Carter, G., Dawson, E.: Twisted edwards curves revisited. In: Pieprzyk, J. (ed.) ASIACRYPT 2008. LNCS, vol. 5350, pp. 326–343. Springer, Heidelberg (2008), http://eprint.iacr.org/2008/522/

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  18. Hlaváč, J., Lórencz, R., Hadáček, M.: True random number generation on an Atmel AVR microcontroller. In: 2010 2nd International Conference on Computer Engineering and Technology (ICCET), vol. 2, pp. 493–495. IEEE (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Hutter, M., Wenger, E.: Fast multi-precision multiplication for public-key cryptography on embedded microprocessors. In: Preneel, B., Takagi, T. (eds.) CHES 2011. LNCS, vol. 6917, pp. 459–474. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  20. Karatsuba, A., Ofman, Y.: Multiplication of Multidigit Numbers on Automata. Soviet Physics-Doklady 7, 595–596 (1963); Translated from Doklady Akademii Nauk SSSR 145(2), 293–294 (July 1962)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Kargl, A., Pyka, S., Seuschek, H.: Fast Arithmetic on ATmega128 for Elliptic Curve Cryptography. IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive, report 2008/442 (October 2008), http://eprint.iacr.org/2008/442

  22. Kocher, P.C.: Timing Attacks on Implementations of Diffie-Hellman, RSA, DSS, and Other Systems. In: Koblitz, N. (ed.) CRYPTO 1996. LNCS, vol. 1109, pp. 104–113. Springer, Heidelberg (1996)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Lange, T.: Vampire – virtual applications and implementations research lab (2007), http://hyperelliptic.org/ECRYPTII/vampire/ (accessed January 28, 2013)

  24. Liu, A., Ning, P.: TinyECC: A Configurable Library for Elliptic Curve Cryptography in Wireless Sensor Networks. In: Proceedings of International Conference on Information Processing in Sensor Networks, IPSN 2008, St. Louis, Missouri, USA, MO, April 22–24, pp. 245–256 (April 2008)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Mangard, S., Oswald, E., Popp, T.: Power Analysis Attacks – Revealing the Secrets of Smart Cards. Springer (2007) ISBN 978-0-387-30857-9

    Google Scholar 

  26. Meiser, G., Eisenbarth, T., Lemke-Rust, K., Paar, C.: Efficient Implementation of eSTREAM Ciphers on 8-bit AVR Microcontrollers. In: International Symposium on Industrial Embedded Systems, SIES 2008, pp. 58–66 (June 2008)

    Google Scholar 

  27. Montgomery, P.L.: Speeding the Pollard and elliptic curve methods of factorization. Mathematics of Computation 48(177), 243–264 (1987), http://www.ams.org/journals/mcom/1987-48-177/S0025-5718-1987-0866113-7/S0025-5718-1987-0866113-7.pdf

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  28. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). FIPS-180-3: Secure Hash Standard (October 2008), http://www.itl.nist.gov/fipspubs/

  29. Center of Mathematical Modeling Sigma. CRS-AVR010X-ECC, http://www.cmmsigma.eu/products/crypto/crs_avr010x.en.html

  30. Scott, M.: MIRACLE – A Multiprecision Integer and Rational Arithmetic C/C++ Library (2003), http://www.shamus.ie

  31. Straus, E.G.: Addition chains of vectors (problem 5125). American Mathematical Monthly 70, 806–808 (1964), http://cr.yp.to/bib/1964/straus.html

    MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  32. Szczechowiak, P., Oliveira, L.B., Scott, M., Collier, M., Dahab, R.: NanoECC: Testing the Limits of Elliptic Curve Cryptography in Sensor Networks. In: Verdone, R. (ed.) EWSN 2008. LNCS, vol. 4913, pp. 305–320. Springer, Heidelberg (2008)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  33. Uhsadel, L., Poschmann, A., Paar, C.: Enabling Full-Size Public-Key Algorithms on 8-Bit Sensor Nodes. In: Stajano, F., Meadows, C., Capkun, S., Moore, T. (eds.) ESAS 2007. LNCS, vol. 4572, pp. 73–86. Springer, Heidelberg (2007)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  34. Wang, H., Li, Q.: Efficient Implementation of Public Key Cryptosystems on Mote Sensors (Short Paper). In: Ning, P., Qing, S., Li, N. (eds.) ICICS 2006. LNCS, vol. 4307, pp. 519–528. Springer, Heidelberg (2006)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  35. Wenzel-Benner, C., Gräf, J.: XBX: eXternal Benchmarking eXtension, http://xbx.das-labor.org/trac/wiki/WikiStart (accessed January 31, 2013)

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Applied Information Processing and Communications (IAIK), Graz University of Technology, Inffeldgasse 16a, 8010, Graz, Austria

    Michael Hutter

  2. Digital Security Group, Radboud University Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9010, 6500GL, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Peter Schwabe

Authors
  1. Michael Hutter
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Peter Schwabe
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Concordia Institute for Information Systems Engineering, Concordia University, 1515 St. Catherine Street West, H3G 2W1, Montreal, QC, Canada

    Amr Youssef

  2. Laboratoire de Mathématiques Nicolas Oresme, Université de Caen Basse-Normandie, BP 5186, 14032, Caen, France

    Abderrahmane Nitaj

  3. Department of Information Technology, Cairo University, 5 Dr. Ahmed Zewil Street, 12613, Cairo, Giza, Egypt

    Aboul Ella Hassanien

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

Hutter, M., Schwabe, P. (2013). NaCl on 8-Bit AVR Microcontrollers. In: Youssef, A., Nitaj, A., Hassanien, A.E. (eds) Progress in Cryptology – AFRICACRYPT 2013. AFRICACRYPT 2013. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 7918. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-38553-7_9

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-38553-7_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-38552-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-38553-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation