Mutual Information Analysis: a Comprehensive Study ? Lejla Batina1;2, Benedikt Gierlichs1, Emmanuel Prouff3, Matthieu Rivain4, Fran¸cois-Xavier Standaert5?? and Nicolas Veyrat-Charvillon5 1 K.U.Leuven, ESAT/SCD-COSIC and IBBT, Kasteelpark Arenberg 10, B-3001 Leuven-Heverlee, Belgium. flejla.batina,
[email protected] 2 Radboud University Nijmegen, CS Dept./Digital Security group, Heyendaalseweg 135, 6525 AJ, Nijmegen, The Netherlands. 3 Oberthur Technologies, 71-73 rue des Hautes P^atures,92726 Nanterre Cedex, France.
[email protected] 4 CryptoExperts, Paris, France.
[email protected] 5 Universit´ecatholique de Louvain, UCL Crypto Group, B-1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. ffstandae,
[email protected] Abstract. Mutual Information Analysis is a generic side-channel dis- tinguisher that has been introduced at CHES 2008. It aims to allow successful attacks requiring minimum assumptions and knowledge of the target device by the adversary. In this paper, we compile recent contri- butions and applications of MIA in a comprehensive study. From a the- oretical point of view, we carefully discuss its statistical properties and relationship with probability density estimation tools. From a practical point of view, we apply MIA in two of the most investigated contexts for side-channel attacks. Namely, we consider first order attacks against an unprotected implementation of the DES in a full custom IC and second order attacks against a masked implementation of the DES in an 8-bit microcontroller. These experiments allow to put forward the strengths and weaknesses of this new distinguisher and to compare it with standard power analysis attacks using the correlation coefficient.