Scribd
Upload
284 views5 pages

Triple DES

Triple DES (3TDES) uses three iterations of the DES cipher to secure data. It operates by encrypting data with key K1, decrypting with K2, and encrypting again with K3. This provides a key length of 168 bits for greater security than single DES. AES was developed later to replace 3TDES and DES due to concerns about their key sizes and performance. AES uses 128, 192, or 256-bit keys and is significantly faster than 3TDES through its substitution-permutation structure and variable number of rounds.

Uploaded by

sai ujwal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
284 views5 pages

Triple DES

Triple DES (3TDES) uses three iterations of the DES cipher to secure data. It operates by encrypting data with key K1, decrypting with K2, and encrypting again with K3. This provides a key length of 168 bits for greater security than single DES. AES was developed later to replace 3TDES and DES due to concerns about their key sizes and performance. AES uses 128, 192, or 256-bit keys and is significantly faster than 3TDES through its substitution-permutation structure and variable number of rounds.

Uploaded by

sai ujwal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 5

3-KEY Triple DES

Before using 3TDES, user first generate and distribute a 3TDES key K,
which consists of three different DES keys K1, K2 and K3. This means that
the actual 3TDES key has length 3×56 = 168 bits. The encryption scheme
is illustrated as follows −

The encryption-decryption process is as follows −


 Encrypt the plaintext blocks using single DES with key K1.

 Now decrypt the output of step 1 using single DES with key K2.

 Finally, encrypt the output of step 2 using single DES with key K3.

 The output of step 3 is the ciphertext.

 Decryption of a ciphertext is a reverse process. User first decrypt using K3, then encrypt with
K2, and finally decrypt with K1.

Due to this design of Triple DES as an encrypt–decrypt–encrypt process, it


is possible to use a 3TDES (hardware) implementation for single DES by
setting K1, K2, and K3 to be the same value. This provides backwards
compatibility with DES.
Second variant of Triple DES (2TDES) is identical to 3TDES except that K3is
replaced by K1. In other words, user encrypt plaintext blocks with key
K1, then decrypt with key K2, and finally encrypt with K1 again. Therefore,
2TDES has a key length of 112 bits.
Triple DES systems are significantly more secure than single DES, but these
are clearly a much slower process than encryption using single DES.

Advanced Encryption Standard


The more popular and widely adopted symmetric encryption algorithm likely
to be encountered nowadays is the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). It
is found at least six time faster than triple DES.
A replacement for DES was needed as its key size was too small. With
increasing computing power, it was considered vulnerable against
exhaustive key search attack. Triple DES was designed to overcome this
drawback but it was found slow.
The features of AES are as follows −

 Symmetric key symmetric block cipher

 128-bit data, 128/192/256-bit keys

 Stronger and faster than Triple-DES

 Provide full specification and design details

 Software implementable in C and Java

Operation of AES
AES is an iterative rather than Feistel cipher. It is based on ‘substitution–
permutation network’. It comprises of a series of linked operations, some of
which involve replacing inputs by specific outputs (substitutions) and others
involve shuffling bits around (permutations).
Interestingly, AES performs all its computations on bytes rather than bits.
Hence, AES treats the 128 bits of a plaintext block as 16 bytes. These 16
bytes are arranged in four columns and four rows for processing as a matrix
−
Unlike DES, the number of rounds in AES is variable and depends on the
length of the key. AES uses 10 rounds for 128-bit keys, 12 rounds for 192-
bit keys and 14 rounds for 256-bit keys. Each of these rounds uses a
different 128-bit round key, which is calculated from the original AES key.
The schematic of AES structure is given in the following illustration −
Encryption Process
Here, we restrict to description of a typical round of AES encryption. Each
round comprise of four sub-processes. The first round process is depicted
below −
Byte Substitution (SubBytes)
The 16 input bytes are substituted by looking up a fixed table (S-box) given
in design. The result is in a matrix of four rows and four columns.

Shiftrows
Each of the four rows of the matrix is shifted to the left. Any entries that
‘fall off’ are re-inserted on the right side of row. Shift is carried out as
follows −
 First row is not shifted.

 Second row is shifted one (byte) position to the left.

 Third row is shifted two positions to the left.

 Fourth row is shifted three positions to the left.

 The result is a new matrix consisting of the same 16 bytes but shifted with respect to each other.

MixColumns
Each column of four bytes is now transformed using a special mathematical
function. This function takes as input the four bytes of one column and
outputs four completely new bytes, which replace the original column. The
result is another new matrix consisting of 16 new bytes. It should be noted
that this step is not performed in the last round.

Addroundkey
The 16 bytes of the matrix are now considered as 128 bits and are XORed
to the 128 bits of the round key. If this is the last round then the output is
the ciphertext. Otherwise, the resulting 128 bits are interpreted as 16 bytes
and we begin another similar round.

Decryption Process
The process of decryption of an AES ciphertext is similar to the encryption
process in the reverse order. Each round consists of the four processes
conducted in the reverse order −

 Add round key

 Mix columns

 Shift rows

 Byte substitution
Since sub-processes in each round are in reverse manner, unlike for a
Feistel Cipher, the encryption and decryption algorithms needs to be
separately implemented, although they are very closely related.
AES Analysis
In present day cryptography, AES is widely adopted and supported in both
hardware and software. Till date, no practical cryptanalytic attacks against
AES has been discovered. Additionally, AES has built-in flexibility of key
length, which allows a degree of ‘future-proofing’ against progress in the
ability to perform exhaustive key searches.
However, just as for DES, the AES security is assured only if it is correctly
implemented and good key management is employed.

You might also like