Secure communication through reliable S-box design: A proposed approach using coset graphs and matrix operations
Abdul Razaq, Ghaliah Alhamzi, S. M. Abbas, Musheer Ahmad, Asima Razzaque
Abstract
Protection of sensitive information has been always the major security concern since decades to withstand against illegitimate access and usage. Substitution-boxes (S-boxes) are vital components of any modern day cryptographic system that allows us to ensure its resistance to attacks. The prime problem with creating S-box is that we are generally unable to discover a consistent distribution among its numerous features to withstand diverse cryptanalysis attacks. The majority of S-boxes investigated in the literature has good cryptographic defenses against some attacks but are susceptible to others. Keeping these considerations in mind, this paper proposes a novel approach for S-box design based on a pair of coset graphs and a newly defined operation of row and column vectors on a square matrix. Several standard performance assessment criteria are used to evaluate the reliability of proposed approach, and the results demonstrate that the developed S-box satisfies all criterions for being robust for secure communication and encryption.