Open AccessLeakage Detection with the x2-Test
Author(s) -
Amir Moradi,
Bastian Richter,
Tobias Schneider,
FrançoisXavier Standaert
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
iacr transactions on cryptographic hardware and embedded systems
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2569-2925
DOI - 10.46586/tches.v2018.i1.209-237
Subject(s) - computer science , leakage (economics) , implementation , toolbox , complement (music) , data mining , algorithm , biochemistry , chemistry , phenotype , complementation , gene , economics , macroeconomics , programming language
We describe how Pearson’s χ2-test can be used as a natural complement to Welch’s t-test for black box leakage detection. In particular, we show that by using these two tests in combination, we can mitigate some of the limitations due to the moment-based nature of existing detection techniques based on Welch’s t-test (e.g., for the evaluation of higher-order masked implementations with insufficient noise). We also show that Pearson’s χ2-test is naturally suited to analyze threshold implementations with information lying in multiple statistical moments, and can be easily extended to a distinguisher for key recovery attacks. As a result, we believe the proposed test and methodology are interesting complementary ingredients of the side-channel evaluation toolbox, for black box leakage detection and non-profiled attacks, and as a preliminary before more demanding advanced analyses.