Paper 2019/1005

Threshold Implementations in the Robust Probing Model

Siemen Dhooghe, Svetla Nikova, and Vincent Rijmen

Abstract

Threshold Implementations (TI) are secure algorithmic countermeasures against side-channel attacks in the form of differential power analysis. The strength of TI lies in its minimal algorithmic requirements. These requirements have been studied over more than 10 years and many efficient implementations for symmetric primitives have been proposed. Thus, over the years the practice of protecting implementations matured, however, the theory behind threshold implementations remained the same. In this work, we revise this theory by looking at the properties of correctness, non-completeness, and uniformity as a composable security model. We prove that this model provides first-order and higher-order univariate security in the glitch-robust probing model which lets us expand the theoretic framework of TI. We first provide a link between uniformity and the notion of non-interference, a known composable security notion building out the probing model. We then relax the notion of non-completeness which helps the design of secure expansion and compression functions. Lastly, we provide generalisations of the threshold notions to allow for general secret sharing schemes and provide examples of how different sharing schemes affect the security and efficiency of the countermeasure.