JH (hash function)

JH

General
Designers	Hongjun Wu
Certification	SHA-3 finalist
Detail
Digest sizes	224, 256, 384, 512
Speed	16.1 cpb on Core 2 in 64-bit mode using SSE2; 37.3 cpb using ANSI C.

JH is a cryptographic hash function submitted to the NIST hash function competition by Hongjun Wu. JH was chosen as one of the five finalists of the competition. JH has a 1024-bit state, and works on 512-bit input blocks. Processing an input block consists of three steps:

1. XOR the input block into the left half of the state.
2. Apply a 42-round unkeyed permutation (encryption function) to the state. This consists of 42 repetitions of:
   1. Break the input into 256 4-bit blocks, and map each through one of two 4-bit S-boxes, the choice being made by a 256-bit round-dependent key schedule. Equivalently, combine each input block with a key bit, and map the result through a 5→4 bit S-box.
   2. Mix adjacent 4-bit blocks using a maximum distance separable code over GF(2⁴).
   3. Permute 4-bit blocks so that they will be adjacent to different blocks in following rounds.
   4. The final half-round consists of an S-box substitution without a following MDS or permutation step.
3. XOR the input block into the right half of the state.

The resulting digest is the first 224, 256, 384 or 512 bits from the 1024-bit final value. It is well suited to a bit slicing implementation using the SSE2 instruction set, giving speeds of 16.8 Cycles per byte.

External links

• The JH web site
• JH page on the SHA-3 Zoo
• A VHDL source codes developed in the Cryptographic Engineering Research Group (CERG) at George Mason University