Simple Power Analysis of Polynomial Multiplication in HQC

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Velek, Pavel, Rabas, Tomáš, Buček, Jiří
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Velek, Pavel
Rabas, Tomáš
Buček, Jiří
author_facet Velek, Pavel
Rabas, Tomáš
Buček, Jiří
contents The Hamming Quasi-Cyclic (HQC) cryptosystem was selected for standardization in the fourth round of the NIST Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) standardization project. The goal of the PQC project is to standardize one or more quantum-resistant public-key cryptographic algorithms. In this paper, we present a single-trace Simple Power Analysis (SPA) attack against HQC that exploits power consumption leakage that occurs during polynomial multiplication performed at the beginning of HQC decryption. Using the ChipWhisperer-Lite board, we perform and evaluate the attack, achieving a 99.69% success rate over 10 000 attack attempts. We also propose various countermeasures against the attack and evaluate their time complexity.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_07634
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Simple Power Analysis of Polynomial Multiplication in HQC
Velek, Pavel
Rabas, Tomáš
Buček, Jiří
Cryptography and Security
The Hamming Quasi-Cyclic (HQC) cryptosystem was selected for standardization in the fourth round of the NIST Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) standardization project. The goal of the PQC project is to standardize one or more quantum-resistant public-key cryptographic algorithms. In this paper, we present a single-trace Simple Power Analysis (SPA) attack against HQC that exploits power consumption leakage that occurs during polynomial multiplication performed at the beginning of HQC decryption. Using the ChipWhisperer-Lite board, we perform and evaluate the attack, achieving a 99.69% success rate over 10 000 attack attempts. We also propose various countermeasures against the attack and evaluate their time complexity.
title Simple Power Analysis of Polynomial Multiplication in HQC
topic Cryptography and Security
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.07634