[Resource Topic] 2012/425: The Stream Cipher Core of the 3GPP Encryption Standard 128-EEA3: Timing Attacks and Countermeasures

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Title:
The Stream Cipher Core of the 3GPP Encryption Standard 128-EEA3: Timing Attacks and Countermeasures

Authors: Gautham Sekar

Abstract:

The core of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) encryption standard 128-EEA3 is a stream cipher called ZUC. It was designed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and proposed for inclusion in the cellular wireless standards called “Long Term Evolution” or “4G”. The LFSR-based cipher uses a 128-bit key. In this paper, we first show timing attacks on ZUC that can recover, with about 71.43% success rate, (i) one bit of the secret key immediately, and (ii) information involving 6 other key bits. The time, memory and data requirements of the attacks are negligible. While we see potential improvements to the attacks, we also suggest countermeasures.

ePrint: https://eprint.iacr.org/2012/425

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