Paper 2001/098

Fast hashing onto elliptic curves over fields of characteristic 3

Paulo S. L. M. Barreto and Hae Yong Kim

Abstract

We describe a fast hash algorithm that maps arbitrary messages onto points of an elliptic curve defined over a finite field of characteristic 3. Our new scheme runs in time $O(m^2)$ for curves over $\GF{3^m}$. The best previous algorithm for this task runs in time $O(m^3)$. Experimental data confirms the speedup by a factor $O(m)$, or approximately a hundred times for practical $m$ values. Our results apply for both standard and normal basis representations of $\GF{3^m}$.