Practical security evaluation against differential and linear cryptanalyses for feistel ciphers with SPN round function

Abstract

This paper studies the upper bounds of the maximum differential and linear characteristic probabilities of Feistel ciphers with SPN round function. In the same way as for SPN ciphers, we consider the minimum number of differential and linear active s-boxes, which provides a measure of the upper bounds of these probabilities, in order to evaluate the security against differential and linear cryptanalyses. The purpose of this work is to clarify the (lower bound of) minimum numbers of active s-boxes in some consecutive rounds of Feistel ciphers, i.e., in three, four, six, eight, and twelve consecutive rounds, using differential and linear branch numbers Pd, Pl, respectively. Furthermore, we investigate the necessary condition for desirable P-functions, which means that the round functions are invulnerable to both differential and linear cryptanalyses. As an example, we show the round function of Camellia, which satisfies the condition.