Chapter 3

Block Ciphers and the

Advanced Encryption Standard

1
Outline
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Substitution-Permutation Networks
3.3 Linear cryptanalysis
3.4 Differential cryptanalysis
3.5 The Data Encryption Standard
3.6 The Advanced Encryption Standard
3.7 Modes of Operation

2
 3.1 Introduction
A commonly used design for modern-day block
ciphers is that of an iterated cipher:
The cipher requires the specification of a round
function and a key schedule, and the encryption
of a plaintext will proceed through Nr similar
rounds.
random key K: used to construct Nr round keys (also
called subkeys), which are denoted K1,,KNr.
key schedule (K1,,KNr): constructed from K using a
fixed, public algorithm.
round function g: takes two inputs: a round key (Kr)
and a current state (wr-1). wr=g(wr-1,Kr) is the next state.
plaintext x: the initial state w0.
Ciphertext y: the state after all Nr rounds done.
3
Introduction
Encryption operations:
w0 x
w1 g ( w0 , K 1 )
w2 g ( w1 , K 2 )
w Nr 1 g ( w Nr 2 , K Nr 1 )
w Nr g ( w Nr 1 , K Nr )
y w Nr
Decryption operations:
w Nr y
w Nr 1 g 1 ( w Nr , K Nr )
w1 g 1 ( w2 , K 2 )
w0 g 1 ( w1 , K 1 )
x w0
Note: function g is injective
(one-to-one)
4
 3.2 Substitution-Permutation
Networks (SPN)
Cryptosystem 3.1: SPN
l, m and Nr are positive integers
S : {0,1}l {0,1}l is a permutation
P : {1,..., lm} {1,..., lm} is a permutation.
P C {0,1}lm , and K ({0,1}lm ) Nr 1 consist of all
possible key schedules that could be derived from
an initial key K using the key scheduling algorithm.
For a key schedule ( K 1 ,..., K Nr 1 ) , we encrypt the
plaintext x using Algorithm 3.1.

5
 Substitution-Permutation
Networks
Algorithm 3.1: SPN ( x, S , P , ( K 1 ,..., K Nr 1 ))
w0 x
for r 1 to Nr 1 ur is the input to the S-
boxes in round r.
u r wr 1 K r vr is the output of the S-
boxes in round r.
for i 1 to m
do r r wr is obtained from vr by
do v( i ) S (u ( i) ) applying P .
wr (v r ,..., v r ur+1 is constructed from
P (1) P ( lm ) )
wr by xor-ing with the
u Nr w Nr 1 K Nr round key Kr+1 (called
for i 1 to m round key mixing).
The very first and last
do v(Nri) S (u(Nri) )
operations are xors with
y v Nr K Nr 1 subkeys (called whitening).
output ( y )
6
 Substitution-Permutation
Networks
Example 3.1:
Suppose l m Nr 4 . Let S be defined as follows,
where the input and the output are written in hexadecimal:

Let P be defined as follows:

See Figure 3.1 for a pictorial representation of this

particular SPN, where Sir means i-th round, r-th S-box.

7
x
u1

v1

w1

u2

v2

w2

u3

v3

w3
Figure 3.1: A substitution-
u4 permutation network

v4

y
8
Substitution-Permutation
Networks
Key schedule: suppose we begin with a 32-bit key
K (k1 ,..., k32 ) {0,1}32 . For 1 r 5 , define Kr to consist of
16 consecutive bits of K, beginning with k4r-3.
K= 0011 1010 1001 0100 1101 0110 0011 1111
Round keys:
K1= 0011 1010 1001 0100
K2= 1010 1001 0100 1101
K3= 1001 0100 1101 0110
K4= 0100 1101 0110 0011
K5= 1101 0110 0011 1111

9
Substitution-Permutation
Networks
Suppose the plaintext is x= 0010 0110 1011 0111.
Then the encryption of x proceeds as follows:
w0= 0010 0110 1011 0111
K1= 0011 1010 1001 0100
u1= 0001 1100 0010 0011
v1= 0100 0101 1101 0001
w1= 0010 1110 0000 0111
K2= 1010 1001 0100 1101
u2= 1000 0111 0100 1010
v2= 0011 1000 0010 0110
w2= 0100 0001 1011 1000

10
Substitution-Permutation
Networks
K3= 1001 0100 1101 0110
u3= 1101 0101 0110 1110
v3= 1001 1111 1011 0000
w3= 1110 0100 0110 1110
K4= 0100 1101 0110 0011
u4= 1010 1001 0000 1101
v4= 0110 1010 1110 1001
K5= 1101 0110 0011 1111, and
y= 1011 1100 1101 0110
is the ciphertext.

11
 3.3 Linear Cryptanalysis
We want to find a probability linear relationship
between a subset of plaintext bits and a subset of
data bits preceding the last round. This relation
behaves in a non-random fashion.
The attacker has a lot of plaintext-ciphertext pairs
(known plaintext attack).
For each candidate subkey, we partially decrypt the
cipher and check if the relation holds. If the relation
holds then increment its corresponding counter. At
the end, the candidate key that counts furthest from
is the most likely subkey.

12
Linear Cryptanalysis
3.3.1 The Piling-up Lemma
Suppose X1, X2, are independent random variables from
{0,1}. And
Pr[ X i 0] pi , i 1,2,... Hence,
Pr[ X i 1] 1 pi , i 1,2,...
The independence of Xi, Xj implies
Pr[ X i 0, X j 0] pi p j
Pr[ X i 0, X j 1] pi (1 p j )
Pr[ X i 1, X j 0] (1 pi ) p j
Pr[ X i 1, X j 1] (1 pi )(1 p j )

13
Linear Cryptanalysis
Now consider X i X j .
Pr[ X i X j 0] pi p j (1 pi )(1 p j )
Pr[ X i X j 1] pi (1 p j ) (1 pi ) p j
The bias of Xi is defined to be the quantity
i pi 12
And we have
12 i 12 ,
Pr[ X i 0] 12 i ,
Pr[ X i 1] 12 i .

14
Linear Cryptanalysis
Let i ,i ,...,i denote the bias of
1 2 k
X i1 X ik .

Lemma 3.1 (Piling-up lemma) : Let i1 ,i2 ,...,ik denote

the bias of the random variable X i X i . Then
1 k
k
i ,i ,...,i 2 k 1 i .
1 2 k j
j 1

Corollary 3.2: Let i1 ,i2 ,...,ik denote the bias of the

random variable X i X i . Suppose that i j 0 for
1 k

some j. Then i1 ,i2 ,...,ik 0 .

15
 Linear Cryptanalysis
3.3.2 Linear Approximations of S-boxes
m n
Consider an S-box S : {0,1} {0,1}.
Let the input m-tuple be X=(x1,,xm). And the output n-tuple be
Y=(y1,,yn).
We can see that
Pr[ X 1 x1 ,..., X m xm , Y1 y1 ,..., Yn yn ] 0
if ( y1 ,..., yn ) S ( x1 ,..., xm ) ; and
Pr[ X 1 x1 ,..., X m xm , Y1 y1 ,..., Yn yn ] 2 m
if ( y1 ,..., yn ) S ( x1 ,..., xm ).
Now we can compute the bias of the form
X i1 X ik Y j1 Y jl
using the formulas stated above.

16
Linear Cryptanalysis
Example 3.2: We use the S-box as Example 3.1.

17
Linear Cryptanalysis
Consider X 1 X 4 Y2 . The probability that X 1 X 4 Y2 0
can be determined by counting the number of rows in which
X 1 X 4 Y2 0 , and then dividing by 16.
It is seen that
1
Pr[ X 1 X 4 Y2 0] 2
Hence, the bias is 0.
If we instead analyze X 3 X 4 Y1 Y4 , we find that the
bias is 3/8.

18
 Linear Cryptanalysis
We can record the bias of all 28=256 possible random
variables.
We represent the relevant random variable in the
form 4 4
ai X i biYi
i 1 i 1
where ai {0,1}, bi {0,1}, i 1,2,3,4 .
We treat (a1,a2,a3,a4) and (b1,b2,b3,b4) as
hexadecimal digit (they are called input sum and
output sum, respectively)

19
Linear Cryptanalysis
Let NL(a,b) denote the number of binary eight-tuples
(x1,x2,x3,x4,y1,y2,y3,y4) s.t
( y1 , y2 , y3 , y4 ) S ( x1 , x2 , x3 , x4 )
and 4 4

ai X i biYi 0
i 1 i 1
The bias is computed as (a, b) ( N L (a, b) 8) / 16 .
The table of all NL is called the linear approximation
table (Figure 3.2).

20
 Example
3.2

Figure 3.2: Linear approximation table: values of

NL(a,b)-8

21
 Linear Cryptanalysis
3.3.3 Linear Attack on an SPN
Linear cryptanalysis requires a set of linear approximations
of S-boxes that can be used to derive a linear approximation
of the entire SPN (excluding the last round).
Figure 3.3 illustrates the structure of the approximation we
will use.
Arrows are the random variables involved in the approximations
and the labeled S-boxes (active S-boxes) are used in the
approximations.

22
x
u1

v1

w1

u2

v2

w2

u3

v3

w3
Figure 3.3: A linear
u4 approximation of an SPN

v4

y
23
 Linear Cryptanalysis
The approximation incorporates four active S-boxes:
In S12, T1 U 51 U 71 U 81 V61 has bias
In S22, T2 U 62 V62 V82 has bias -
In S32, T3 U 63 V63 V83 has bias -
In S34, T4 U143 V143 V163 has bias -
T1 , T2 , T3 , T4 have biases that are high in absolute value.
Further, we will see their XOR will lead to
cancellations of intermediate random variables.

24
Linear Cryptanalysis
Using Piling-up lemma, T1 T2 T3 T4 has bias equal
to 23(1/4)(-1/4)3=-1/32.
Note: we assume the four r.v are independent.
Then T1 , T2 , T3 , T4 can be expressed in terms of
plaintext bits, bits of u4 (input to the last round) and
key bits as follows:
T1 U 51 U 71 U 81 V61 X 5 K 51 X 7 K 71 X 8 K 81 V61
T2 U 62 V62 V82 V61 K 62 V62 V82
T3 U 63 V63 V83 V62 K 63 V63 V83
T4 U143 V143 V163 V82 K143 V143 V163

25
Linear Cryptanalysis
XOR the right side and we get
X 5 X 7 X 8 V63 V83 V143 V163
K 51 K 71 K 81 K 62 K 63 K143 (3.1)

Then replace Vi 3 by U i4 and key bits:

V63 U 64 K 64 V83 U144 K144
V143 U 84 K 84 V163 U164 K164
Now substitute them into 3.1:
X 5 X 7 X 8 U 64 U 84 U144 U164
K 51 K 71 K 81 K 62 K 63 K143 K 64 K 84 K144 K164 (3.2)
26
 Linear Cryptanalysis
The expression above only involves plaintext bits, bits
of u4 and key bits.
Suppose the key bits are fixed. Then
K 51 K 71 K 81 K 62 K 63 K143 K 64 K 84 K144 K164

has the (fixed) value 0 or 1.

It follows that
X 5 X 7 X 8 U 64 U 84 U 144 U164 (3.3)
has bias -1/32 or 1/32 where the sign depends on
the key bits (=0 or =1).

27
 Linear Cryptanalysis
The fact that (3.3) has bias bounded away from 0
allows us to carry out linear attack.
Suppose that we have T plaintext-ciphertext pairs
(denoted by ), all use the same unknown key, K.
The attack will allow us to obtain the eight key bits,
K 55 , K 65 , K 75 , K 85 , K135 , K145 , K155 , K165
There are 28=256 possibilities for the eight key bits.
We refer to a binary 8-tuple as a candidate subkey.

28
 Linear Cryptanalysis
For each ( x, y ) and for each candidate subkey, we
compute a partial decryption of y and obtain the
resulting value for u(42 ) ,u(44) .
Then we compute the value
x5 x7 x8 u64 u84 u144 u164 (3.4)
We maintain an array of counters indexed by the 256
possible candidate subkeys, and increment the
counter corresponding to a particular subkey when
(3.4) has the value 0.
In the end, we expect most counters will have a
value close to T/2, but the correct candidate subkey
will close to T/2T/32.
29
 Linear Cryptanalysis
The attack is presented as Algorithm 3.2.
L1 and L2 are hexadecimal value.
S 1 is the inverse of the S-box.
The output, maxkey, contains the most likely subkey.
In general, it is suggested that a linear attack based
on a linear approximation having bias will be
successful if the number of plaintext-ciphertext pairs
2
is approximately c for some small constant c.

30
for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F )
1
do Count[ L1 , L2 ] 0 Algorithm 3.2: LINEARATTACK( , T , S )
for each ( x, y )
for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F )
4
v( 2 ) L1 y( 2 )
4
v( 4 ) L2 y( 4 )
u 4 1 (v 4 )
( 2) S ( 2)
do 4 1 4
do u( 4 ) S (v( 4 ) )
z x x x u 4 u 4 u 4 u 4
5 7 8 6 8 14 16

if z 0

then Count[ L1 , L2 ] Count[ L1 , L2 ] 1

max 1
for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F )


Count[ L1 , L2 ]|Count[ L1 , L2 ]T / 2|

do if Count[ L1 , L2 ] max

then maxCount[ L1 , L2 ]
maxkey( L1 , L2 )
output (maxkey) 31
 3.4 Differential Cryptanalysis
The main difference from linear attack is that
differential attack involves comparing the XOR of two
inputs to the XOR of the corresponding outputs.
Differential attack is a chosen-plaintext attack.
We consider inputs x and x* having a specified XOR
value denoted by x' x x * .
We decrypt y and y* using all possible key and
determine if their XOR has a certain value. Whenever
it does, increment the corresponding counter. At the
end, we expect the largest one is the most likely
subkey.
32
 Differential Cryptanalysis
Definition 3.1:
m n
Let S : {0,1} {0,1} be an S-box. Consider an
(ordered) pair of bitstrings of length m, say (x,x*).
We say that the input XOR of the S-box is x x *
and the output XOR is S ( x) S ( x*) .
For any x' {0,1}m, define the set (x' ) to consist
of all the ordered pairs (x,x*) having input XOR
equal to x.

33
 Differential Cryptanalysis
It is easy to see that any set (x' ) contains 2m pairs,
and that
( x' ) {( x, x x' ) : x {0,1}m }
For each pair in (x' ) , we can compute the output
XOR of the S-box. Then we can tabulate the
distribution of output XORs. There are 2m output
XORs which are distributed among 2n possible values.
A non-uniform output distribution will be the basis for a
successful attack.

34
Differential Cryptanalysis
Example 3.3:
We use the same S-box as before. Suppose we consider
input XOR x=1011. Then
(1011) {(0000,1011), (0001,1010),..., (1111,0100)}
We compute the following table, where
x x* 1011,
y S ( x), y* S ( x*),
y' y y *

35
 x x* y y* y
0000 1011 1110 1100 0010
0000 0 1000 0
0001 1010 0100 0110 0010
0010 1001 1101 1010 0111 0001 0 1001 0
0011 1000 0001 0011 0010
0010 8 1010 0
0100 1111 0010 0111 0101
0101 1110 1111 0000 1111 0011 0 1011 0
0110 1101 1011 1001 0010 0100 0 1100 0
0111 1100 1000 0101 1101
1000 0011 0011 0001 0010 0101 2 1101 2
1001 0010 1010 1101 0111 0110 0 1110 0
1010 0001 0110 0100 0010
1011 0000 1100 1110 0010 0111 2 1111 2
1100 0111 0101 1000 1101 Number of output
1101 0110 1001 1011 0010
1110 0101 0000 1111 1111
1111 0100 0111 0010 0101 Distribution table for x=1011

36
Differential Cryptanalysis
In Example 3.3, only 5 of the 16 possible output
XORs occur. It has a very non-uniform distribution.
We can compute all possible input XORs as Example
3.3.
Define
N D ( x' , y ' ) | {( x, x*) ( x' ) : S ( x) S ( x*) y '} |

ND(x,y) counts the number of pairs with input XOR equal to

x and output XOR equal to y. (Figure 3.4)

37
 Example
3.3

Figure 3.4: Difference distribution table: values of ND(x,y)

38
Differential Cryptanalysis
An input XOR is computed as
u(ri ) (u(ri ) )* ( w(ri)1 K (ri ) ) (( w(ri)1 ) * K (ri ) )
w(ri)1 ( w(ri)1 ) *
Therefore, the input XOR does not depend on the subkey
bits used in round r; it is equal to the (permuted) output
XOR of round r-1.

Let a denote the input XOR and let b denote the

output XOR. (a,b) is called a differential.

39
 Differential Cryptanalysis
propagation ratio Rp(a,b):
N D ( a ' , b' )
R p ( a ' , b' )
2m
Rp(a,b) can be interpreted as a conditional probability:
Pr[output XOR b' | input XOR a ' ] R p (a ' , b' )
We combine differentials in consecutive rounds to
form a differential trail. A particular differential
trail is shown in Figure 3.5.

40
x
u1

v1

w1

u2

v2

w2

u3

v3

w3

u4 Figure 3.5: A differential trail

for a SPN
v4

y
41
 Differential Cryptanalysis
The differential attack arising from Figure 3.5 uses
the following propagation ratios of differentials:
In S12 , R p (1011,0010) 1 / 2
In S 23 , R p (0100,0110) 3 / 8
In S32 , R p (0010,0101) 3 / 8
In S33 , R p (0010,0101) 3 / 8

We therefore obtain a propagation ratio for a

differential trail of the first three rounds of the SPN:
3
1 3 27
R p (0000 1011 0000 0000, 0000 0101 0101 0000)
2 8 1024

42
Differential Cryptanalysis
In other words,
x' 0000 1011 0000 0000 (v 3 )' 0000 0101 0101 0000
with probability 27/1024. However,
(v 3 )' 0000 0101 0101 0000 (u 4 )' 0000 0110 0000 0110
Hence, it follows that
x' 0000 1011 0000 0000 (u 4 )' 0000 0110 0000 0110
with probability 27/1024.

43
 Differential Cryptanalysis
Algorithm 3.3 presents the attack algorithm.
The input and output are similar to linear attack,
except that is a set (x,x*,y,y*), where x is fixed.
Algorithm 3.3 makes use of a certain filtering
operation. Tuples (x,x*,y,y*) for which the
differential holds are often called right pairs, and
allow us to determine the key bits.
A right pair has the form
(u(41) )' (u(43) )' 0000
Hence we consider those y(1) ( y(1) ) * and y(3) ( y(3) ) *.

44
for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F ) Algorithm 3.3:
do Count[ L1 , L2 ] 0
DIFFERENTIALATTACK( , T , S 1)
for each ( x, y, x*, y*)
if ( y(1) ( y(1) )*) and ( y( 3) ( y(3) )*)

for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F )

v(42 ) L1 y( 2)
4
max 1
v( 4 ) L2 y( 4)
4
1 for ( L1 , L2 ) (0,0) to ( F , F )
u ( 2 ) S (v(42) )

4 1 if Count[ L1 , L2 ] max
u( 4 ) S (v(44) )
do
4 max Count[ L1 , L2 ]
(v( 2 ) )* L1 ( y( 2) ) *
do then maxkey ( L , L )
4 1 2
then do (v( 4 ) )* L2 ( y( 4) ) *
4 1 4
output (maxkey)
(u ( 2 ) )* S (( v( 2 ) )*)
4 1 4
(u ( 4 ) )* S (( v( 4 ) )*)
4 4 4
(u ( 2 ) )' u ( 2 ) ( u ( 2) ) *

4
(u( 4 ) )' u(44 ) (u(44) ) *

if ((u 4 )' 0110) and ((u 4 )' 0110)
( 2) (4)

then Count[ L1 , L2 ] Count[ L1 , L2 ] 1

45
Differential Cryptanalysis
A differential attack based on a differential trail
having propagation ratio equal to will often be
successful if the number of tuples (x,x*,y,y*), which
1
we denote by T, is approximately c , for a small
constant c.

46