Attacks on implementations of cryptographic algorithms: side-channel and fault attacks

Abstract

Cryptographic algorithms, which withstand cryptanalysis after years of rigorous theoretical study and detailed scrutiny have been shown to succumb to attacks that exploit the vulnerabilities in their implementations. Therefore, there has been a vast amount of research effort to find potential vulnerabilities in the implementation of cryptographic algorithms, and efficient and effective countermeasures if such vulnerabilities exist. In this paper, we survey side-channel and fault attacks, which are two powerful methods that have been demonstrated to render many implementations effectively broken. While we categorically analyze the attack techniques, possible countermeasures will also be discussed.