Cryptology ePrint Archive: Report 2006/176

Counting points on elliptic curves in medium characteristic

Antoine Joux and Reynald Lercier

Abstract: In this paper, we revisit the problem of computing the kernel of a separable isogeny of degree $\ell$ between two elliptic curves defined over a finite field $\GF{q}$ of characteristic $p$. We describe an algorithm the asymptotic time complexity of which is equal to $\SoftO(\ell^2(1+\ell/p)\log q)$ bit operations. This algorithm is particularly useful when $\ell > p$ and as a consequence, we obtain an improvement of the complexity of the SEA point counting algorithm for small values of $p$. More precisely, we obtain a heuristic time complexity $\SoftO(\log^{4} q)$ and a space complexity $O(\log^{2} q)$, in the previously unfavorable case where $p \simeq \log q$. Compared to the best previous algorithms, the memory requirements of our SEA variation are smaller by a $\log^2 q$ factor.

Category / Keywords: public-key cryptography / elliptic curve cryptosystem

Date: received 19 May 2006

Contact author: reynald lercier at m4x org

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Version: 20060522:130905 (All versions of this report)

Short URL: ia.cr/2006/176

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