Study and Development of Rijndael Encryption System

Abstract

Pakistan Navy has its own Intranet, which is being extensively utilized for information sharing and transmission of electronic mail among various units. Due to nonavailability of adequate security measures, information of higher security classification cannot be transmitted through this Intranet. Hence, there is a need to implement some encryption system, for secure transmission of classified information. My present project deals with selection, study and development of an appropriate Encryption System, for Pakistan Navy. First chapter provides general introduction of Naval Intranet and an overview of Encryption Systems. Chapter 2 enlists the selection proced ure adopted by National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) for selection of Advance Encryption Standard (AES) to be used by US Govt. Rijndael Encryption System presented by Joan Daemen and Vincent Rijmen has been selected as AES for use by US Govt, the same is selected for study and its development for use by Pakistan Navy. The main idea behind writing this chapter here, is to promote the culture or Selection/Implementation or an Advance Encryption System (AES) at National/ Organizational level. Design of the cipher is discussed in Chapter 3. Rijndac l is a block cipher which uses non-feistel structure. It can be implemented on 128, 192 & 256 bits key lengths. Key features of its design are: resistance against well known attacks, speed and code compactness on a wide range of platforms and design simplicity. The Cipher uses a non lcistel structure with I 0.12 or 14 rounds depending on the value of the key. Each round consists of Byte substitution. Shift row, Mix Column and Add round key functions. Chapter 4 deals with strength of Rijndael Encryption System against the known attacks. Chapter 5 covers some implementation aspects of the cipher. Interestingly the four functions of the design can be combined together into new lookup tables resulting in a very fast and compact implementation.