official Journal of AlNoor University

Lightweight Encryption: A Comprehensive Review of Design Evolution and Architectural Extensions

Document Type : Review Article

Authors

Department of Computer Science/ University of Mosul/ Mosul - Iraq

10.69513/jncs.v3.i1.a8
Abstract
The rapid development of the Internet of Things (IoT) and other resource-constrained applications has increased the importance of research and development in lightweight cryptographic algorithms. This has led to a greater focus on security and performance in both hardware and software, aiming to optimize them to meet the demands of resource-constrained applications in terms of power and memory consumption, acceptable security levels, and the urgent need to fulfill these requirements. Numerous algorithms have been proposed, and international competitions have been held to select the best algorithm based on a simple structure and low computational complexity. This study reviews and analyzes several early and proposed lightweight cryptographic algorithms, focusing on their structure, mechanism, and parameters, as well as their characteristics, limitations, and the problems they solve. Block size, key size, memory space, execution time and etc. used as a matrix for comparison between the LWC algorithm. The selection of a good LWC algorithm depended on this matrix also with the algorithm's feature limitation and the environment nature that used the algorithm. The research provides a scientific reference basis for selecting the most suitable algorithm for a specific resource-constrained application.

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