NIST Announces First Set of Algorithms to Defend Against Quantum Computer Attacks

TapTechNews August 14th news, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) released a press release announcing the first set of algorithms specifically designed to defend against quantum computer attacks.

The world's Internet traffic, financial systems, and public and private communication infrastructures all rely on algorithms that can prevent unauthorized users from reading private information intended only for a few people.

Existing algorithms are all designed for traditional computers and cannot cope with the upcoming quantum era. Many security research experts are worried that quantum computers can use quantum algorithms such as Grover's and Shor's to break through the existing security protection.

For this reason, the National Institute of Standards and Technology has published 3 algorithms on its official website, and TapTechNews attaches the relevant brief introduction as follows:

CRYSTALS-Kyber: Focuses on the standard for general encryption, and NIST named it Module-Lattice-Based Key-Encapsulation Mechanism Standard, abbreviated as ML-KEM.

CRYSTALS-Dilithium: Digital signature algorithm, Module-Lattice-Based Digital Signature Algorithm (ML-DSA).

Sphincs+: Digital signature algorithm, Stateless Hash-Based Digital Signature Algorithm (SLH-DSA).

Among them, ML-DSA is the main defense line of NIST, and the backup standard is SLH-DSA, which is used when ML-DSA is compromised.

SLH-DSA is not the only backup standard that NIST is studying. Although these three standards have been publicly released, the agency is developing two other standards, one for regular encryption and the other for digital signatures.

Related Reading:

To Cope with Quantum Attacks, the US Will Release Post-Quantum Encryption Standards and 3 Data Encryption Algorithms