Author(s)

E. Franti & M. Dascalu

Abstract

This paper presents a complex project that aims towards the development and design of an encryption system with an evolutive key based on the cellular automata model. The novelty and the main interest in our project is the orientation towards the hardware implementation. Most of the research effort was concentrated on the algorithm for generating the evolutive key. The final solution is based on cellular automata and gives a special constructive simplicity, simultaneously with a very high complexity of the evolution of the keys. Special software has been developed for the analysis of different encryption/decryption strategies with cellular automata. Between the various strategies and algorithms studied, the best were selected for hardware implementation. The implementation of the encryption system was realized on the Spartan 3 XC3S400 platform produced by Xilinx. The result is a fast, cheap, efficient and versatile cryptographic system implemented on a FPGA Spartan III platform. Keywords: cryptography, parallel computing, cellular automata, hardware/software co-design. 1 Introduction In this age of information, communications and electronic connectivity, security is a topic of general interest that should never be underestimated. The security of databases, of data communications, of Internet connections, of scientific research and of personal e-mail and phone calls are examples for cases in which the encryption of data/information plays a major role. Therefore, cryptography has become an important field of theoretical research and applications development, not only in military communications as it was at its origins.

Keywords

cryptography, parallel computing, cellular automata, hardware/software co-design.