Evaluation of Hardware Performance for the SHA-3 Candidates Using SASEBO-GII

As a result of extensive analyses on cryptographic hash functions, NIST started an open competition for selecting a new standard hash function SHA-3. One important aspect of this competition is in evaluating hardware implementations and in collecting much attention of researchers in this area. For a fair comparison of the hardware performance, we propose an evaluation platform, a hardware design strategy, and evaluation criteria that must be consistent for all SHA-3 candidates. First, we define specifications of interface for the SASEBO-GII platform that are suitable for evaluating the performance in real-life hash applications, while one can also evaluate the performance of the SHA-3 core function that has an ideal interface. Second, we discuss the design strategy for high-throughput hardware implementations. Lastly, we explain the evaluation criteria to compare the cost and speed performance of eight SHA-3 candidates out of fourteen.