The transition to a quantum-resistant Internet is a complex process that depends on the integration of post-quantum cryptographic primitives into existing security protocols. This paper analyzes the impact that the primitives selected by NIST in their post-quantum cryptography competition has on a critical Internet security protocol, the TLS protocol. The analysis is facilitated by a framework that enables the implementation of an evaluation scenario in which different post-quantum primitives can be tested under identical conditions, ensuring a fair comparison. Our results indicate that the computational overhead introduced by current post-quantum standards in TLS is comparable to that of traditional algorithms, and even more efficient at high security levels. However, their significant impact on data transmission constrains the transition to a full-fledged quantum-safe web.
The transition to a quantum-resistant Internet is a complex process that depends on the integration of post-quantum cryptographic primitives into existing security protocols. This paper analyzes the impact that the primitives selected by NIST in their post-quantum cryptography competition has on a critical Internet security protocol, the TLS protocol. The analysis is facilitated by a framework that enables the implementation of an evaluation scenario in which different post-quantum primitives can be tested under identical conditions, ensuring a fair comparison. Our results indicate that the computational overhead introduced by current post-quantum standards in TLS is comparable to that of traditional algorithms, and even more efficient at high security levels. However, their significant impact on data transmission constrains the transition to a full-fledged quantum-safe web.
Quantum computers pose a significant threat to widely used cryptographic schemes, making it crucial to urgently shift to post-quantum protocols that ensure the long-term security of communications. This paper presents a framework for facilitating the transition to a quantum-resistant web by enabling the evaluation of the impact of integrating post-quantum and hybrid cryptographic primitives in the TLS protocol. By leveraging the OpenSSL library, the framework enables the seamless evaluation and comparison of key encapsulation mechanisms (KEMs) and signature schemes provided by the Open Quantum Safe project. The proposed framework is used to analyze different TLS configurations involving classic, hybrid and post-quantum primitives, with a focus on those selected by NIST. The study concentrates on evaluating the performance impact and the data overhead introduced by configurations involving primitives at different security levels. It starts by benchmarking standalone cryptographic primitives and continues with the evaluation of TLS configurations with hybrid and post-quantum KEMs under controlled network conditions, as this is the first natural step for a transition to a quantum-safe TLS. An impact analysis on real-world scenarios follows. Finally, our evaluation concentrates on providing insight into the cost of shifting to TLS configurations involving only hybrid or post-quantum primitives.
The rapid advancement of quantum computing threatens the security foundations of today’s communication protocols. On the web, the traditional approach to securing web traffic has been to couple HTTP with TLS over TCP, but QUIC over UDP has recently emerged as an alternative to reduce latency and improve performance over unreliable networks. The need for an urgent transition to quantum-resistant web protocols demands further examination of both stacks. Consequently, in this work we evaluate their performance when combined with post-quantum primitives. To this end, we devise a practical evaluation framework that integrates the cryptographic primitives into TLS and QUIC implementations. Our analysis focuses on comparing the impact of hybrid and post-quantum primitives on TLS and QUIC under both ideal and realistic network conditions, providing quantitative insights into the performance cost and feasibility of transitioning toward a post-quantum web. Our results indicate that hybrid KEMs incur the highest handshake latency and bandwidth overhead, while pure post-quantum KEMs offer a favorable trade-off between security and performance, with only moderate costs. Moreover, QUIC consistently reduces the performance penalty of post-quantum primitives compared to TLS, especially in lossy network environments.
Aim: The imminent advent of large-scale quantum computers within the next years is expected to highly affect the security of several cryptosystems that are now considered secure; this mainly holds for classical, long-established, public key cryptographic algorithms such as RSA and elliptic curve cryptography. Apparently, any security protocol that relies on such ciphers, including the transport layer security (TLS) protocol which constitutes a somewhat de facto standard for the security on the web, will not be considered secure in the post-quantum era. To alleviate the security risks stemming from quantum computing, several proposals have been submitted to the relevant procedure initiated by NIST towards evaluating and standardizing one or more quantum-resistant public-key cryptographic algorithms. This paper focuses on embedding post-quantum secure cryptographic algorithms into the TLS protocol to analyze its performance. More precisely, the paper aims to analyze whether this transition to post-quantum secure algorithms will have a significant impact on the user experience due to the possible increase of client--server communication times. Methods: Having as the starting point several important works in the field, several experiments were carried out, using combinations of cloud and local virtual machines per case and considering all the post-quantum cryptographic algorithm finalists for key exchange from the third round of the ongoing NIST process, for various cryptographic as well as network parameters. Results: Our results exhibit that, for key exchange in TLS, the best performance among the post-quantum secure ciphers is achieved by the Saber and CRYSTAL-Kyber variants for all security levels, regardless of the underlying computing power. The performance is comparable to that of the corresponding one achieved by a classical elliptic curve algorithm for key exchange for both RTT and packet loss ratio — i.e., the network parameters seem to have the same effect on post-quantum secure algorithms as in the case of a conventional elliptic curve algorithm. However, the effect of the network parameters on the performance is more crucial than the effect of the underlying chosen ciphers. Conclusion: According to the experiments, we conclude that there exist very promising algorithms that could be utilized in TLS in the near future, which may behave even better than the conventional elliptic curve algorithms for key exchange. It should also be pointed out that NIST announced on 5 July 2022 (i.e., after the completion of our research experiments) that, for general encryption used when we access secure websites, the CRYSTALS-Kyber algorithm has been selected, having as one of its advantages the speed of operation. Hence, the results of our paper are fully in line with the progress of the NIST process. Taking into account that the NIST process is still ongoing (now in its fourth round) with the aim to select more algorithms, as well as that some algorithms may be standardized outside NIST, it becomes evident that our results provide very useful insights on performance aspects of the post-quantum secure algorithms.
The threats are existential to the traditional cryptosystems of public keys, including RSA, Diffie-Hellman, and elliptic curve cryptography (ECC), due to the rapid progress in quantum computing. Such algorithms as the Shor and Grover algorithms prove that as soon as large scale quantum computers are achieved, these classical cryptographic protocols will not provide any privacy and integrity to online communication. This has created an emergency to find post-quantum cryptography (PQC), or quantum-safe cryptography, which will resist attacks by both classical and quantum attackers. The paper is a review of the latest research and development in post-quantum cryptographic algorithms and their implementation in current security systems. We organize quantum-safe methods into significant organizations such as lattice-based, hash-based, multivariate polynomial-based and code-based encrypted communications. Each type has been evaluated critically based on computational efficiency, key sizes, speed of encryption/decryption and security proofs. The survey also examines the current standardization activities happening in the world and especially the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) PQC competition, which lists candidate algorithms that have advanced to standard adoption. Besides this, the paper addresses hybrid cryptographic designs that use both classical and post-quantum bases in ensuring a seamless migration in the transition phase. Internet security protocols like TLS, VPNs and blockchain consensus as applications of PQC are examined in detail. Lastly, we pinpoint open research issues, which include creating lightweight PQC to support resource-constrained IoT devices, balancing performance and strong security assurances, and interoperability between the new PQC algorithms and existing infrastructures. Through detailed survey we inform the future of researchers, practitioners, and policymakers on the preparation of the post-quantum era of secure digital communications.
The rise of quantum computing presents a significant threat to current cryptographic protocols, including SSL/TLS, which are fundamental to secure communication over the internet. This paper provides a comprehensive review of quantum-resistant SSL/TLS implementations to address the looming risks posed by quantum attacks. Using the PRISMA methodology, 766 articles were screened, with 27 meeting the inclusion criteria for in-depth analysis. The study evaluates the design, testing, and validation processes of quantum-resistant algorithms such as SPHINCS+, CRYSTALS-Kyber, and Dilithium, emphasising their integration into TLS 1.3. Key findings highlight advancements in algorithmic choices, protocol modifications, and security assurances while addressing challenges like computational overhead and compatibility issues. By offering a thorough assessment of current developments, this paper aims to guide future research and practical deployment of quantum-resistant cryptography to safeguard digital communications in the post-quantum era
Quantum Computers (QCs) differ radically from traditional computers and can efficiently solve mathematical problems fundamental to our current cryptographic algorithms. Although existing QCs need to accommodate more qubits to break cryptographic algorithms, the concern of ''Store-Now-Decrypt-Later'' (i.e., adversaries store encrypted data today and decrypt them once powerful QCs become available) highlights the necessity to adopt quantum-safe approaches as soon as possible. In this work, we investigate the performance impact of Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) on TLS 1.3. Different signature algorithms and key agreements (as proposed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)) are examined through black- and white-box measurements to get precise handshake latencies and computational costs per participating library. We emulated loss, bandwidth, and delay to analyze constrained environments. Our results reveal that HQC and Kyber are on par with our current state-of-the-art, while Dilithium and Falcon are even faster. We observed no performance drawback from using hybrid algorithms; moreover, on higher NIST security levels, PQC outperformed any algorithm in use today. Hence, we conclude that post-quantum TLS is suitable for adoption in today's systems.