423 research outputs found
Quantum resource estimates for computing elliptic curve discrete logarithms
We give precise quantum resource estimates for Shor's algorithm to compute
discrete logarithms on elliptic curves over prime fields. The estimates are
derived from a simulation of a Toffoli gate network for controlled elliptic
curve point addition, implemented within the framework of the quantum computing
software tool suite LIQ. We determine circuit implementations for
reversible modular arithmetic, including modular addition, multiplication and
inversion, as well as reversible elliptic curve point addition. We conclude
that elliptic curve discrete logarithms on an elliptic curve defined over an
-bit prime field can be computed on a quantum computer with at most qubits using a quantum circuit of at most Toffoli gates. We are able to classically simulate the
Toffoli networks corresponding to the controlled elliptic curve point addition
as the core piece of Shor's algorithm for the NIST standard curves P-192,
P-224, P-256, P-384 and P-521. Our approach allows gate-level comparisons to
recent resource estimates for Shor's factoring algorithm. The results also
support estimates given earlier by Proos and Zalka and indicate that, for
current parameters at comparable classical security levels, the number of
qubits required to tackle elliptic curves is less than for attacking RSA,
suggesting that indeed ECC is an easier target than RSA.Comment: 24 pages, 2 tables, 11 figures. v2: typos fixed and reference added.
ASIACRYPT 201
Quantum attacks on Bitcoin, and how to protect against them
The key cryptographic protocols used to secure the internet and financial
transactions of today are all susceptible to attack by the development of a
sufficiently large quantum computer. One particular area at risk are
cryptocurrencies, a market currently worth over 150 billion USD. We investigate
the risk of Bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies, to attacks by quantum
computers. We find that the proof-of-work used by Bitcoin is relatively
resistant to substantial speedup by quantum computers in the next 10 years,
mainly because specialized ASIC miners are extremely fast compared to the
estimated clock speed of near-term quantum computers. On the other hand, the
elliptic curve signature scheme used by Bitcoin is much more at risk, and could
be completely broken by a quantum computer as early as 2027, by the most
optimistic estimates. We analyze an alternative proof-of-work called Momentum,
based on finding collisions in a hash function, that is even more resistant to
speedup by a quantum computer. We also review the available post-quantum
signature schemes to see which one would best meet the security and efficiency
requirements of blockchain applications.Comment: 21 pages, 6 figures. For a rough update on the progress of Quantum
devices and prognostications on time from now to break Digital signatures,
see https://www.quantumcryptopocalypse.com/quantum-moores-law
Improved quantum circuits for elliptic curve discrete logarithms
We present improved quantum circuits for elliptic curve scalar
multiplication, the most costly component in Shor's algorithm to compute
discrete logarithms in elliptic curve groups. We optimize low-level components
such as reversible integer and modular arithmetic through windowing techniques
and more adaptive placement of uncomputing steps, and improve over previous
quantum circuits for modular inversion by reformulating the binary Euclidean
algorithm. Overall, we obtain an affine Weierstrass point addition circuit that
has lower depth and uses fewer gates than previous circuits. While previous
work mostly focuses on minimizing the total number of qubits, we present
various trade-offs between different cost metrics including the number of
qubits, circuit depth and -gate count. Finally, we provide a full
implementation of point addition in the Q# quantum programming language that
allows unit tests and automatic quantum resource estimation for all components.Comment: 22 pages, to appear in: Int'l Conf. on Post-Quantum Cryptography
(PQCrypto 2020
Reducing the Depth of Quantum FLT-Based Inversion Circuit
Works on quantum computing and cryptanalysis has increased significantly in
the past few years. Various constructions of quantum arithmetic circuits, as
one of the essential components in the field, has also been proposed. However,
there has only been a few studies on finite field inversion despite its
essential use in realizing quantum algorithms, such as in Shor's algorithm for
Elliptic Curve Discrete Logarith Problem (ECDLP). In this study, we propose to
reduce the depth of the existing quantum Fermat's Little Theorem (FLT)-based
inversion circuit for binary finite field. In particular, we propose follow a
complete waterfall approach to translate the Itoh-Tsujii's variant of FLT to
the corresponding quantum circuit and remove the inverse squaring operations
employed in the previous work by Banegas et al., lowering the number of CNOT
gates (CNOT count), which contributes to reduced overall depth and gate count.
Furthermore, compare the cost by firstly constructing our method and previous
work's in Qiskit quantum computer simulator and perform the resource analysis.
Our approach can serve as an alternative for a time-efficient implementation.Comment: version 0.
Applying Grover's algorithm to AES: quantum resource estimates
We present quantum circuits to implement an exhaustive key search for the
Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) and analyze the quantum resources required
to carry out such an attack. We consider the overall circuit size, the number
of qubits, and the circuit depth as measures for the cost of the presented
quantum algorithms. Throughout, we focus on Clifford gates as the
underlying fault-tolerant logical quantum gate set. In particular, for all
three variants of AES (key size 128, 192, and 256 bit) that are standardized in
FIPS-PUB 197, we establish precise bounds for the number of qubits and the
number of elementary logical quantum gates that are needed to implement
Grover's quantum algorithm to extract the key from a small number of AES
plaintext-ciphertext pairs.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, 5 tables; to appear in: Proceedings of the 7th
International Conference on Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQCrypto 2016
A usability study of elliptic curves
In the recent years, the need of information security has rapidly increased due to an enormous growth of data transmission. In this thesis, we study the uses of elliptic curves in the cryptography. We discuss the elliptic curves over finite fields, attempts to attack; discrete logarithm, Pollard’s rho algorithm, baby-step giant-step algorithm, Pohlig-Hellman algorithm, function field sieve, and number field sieve. The main cryptographic reason to use elliptic curves over finite fields is to provide arbitrarily large finite cyclic groups having a computationally difficult discrete logarithm problem
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