Abstract

This paper analyses the cryptographic hash function SHA1 in encryption mode. A detailed analysis is given of the resistance of SHA-1 against the most powerful known attacks today. It is concluded that none of these attacks can be applied successfully in practice to SHA-1. Breaking SHA-1 in encryption mode requires either an unrealistic amount of computation time and known/chosen texts, or a major breakthrough in cryptanalysis. The original motivation for this analysis is to investigate a block cipher named SHACAL based on these principles.

Citations