A Lightweight Fault-Detection Scheme for Barrett Modular Multiplication Using Multiple Conditional Reduction Paths

2026-08-11

AI Summary

This work addresses the vulnerability of Barrett modular multiplication units—widely employed in post-quantum cryptographic schemes (e.g., Kyber, Dilithium) and fully homomorphic encryption systems (e.g., BGV, BFV, CKKS)—to fault-induced information leakage stemming from side-channel attacks, hardware Trojans, and circuit aging. To mitigate these risks, the paper introduces, for the first time, a lightweight fault detection scheme based on Statistical Reduction Monitoring (SRM). The proposed approach enables real-time monitoring of the modular multiplication process through multiple conditional reduction paths and integrates lightweight verification logic for efficient fault awareness. This method achieves significantly enhanced detection coverage against both random and burst faults, whether malicious or non-malicious, while imposing minimal hardware overhead and preserving the original computational throughput.

Abstract

Polynomial multiplication is the most resource-, time-, and energy-critical operation in lattice-based Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) and Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) schemes. Lattice-based PQC schemes such as Kyber and Dilithium have already been standardized, while lattice- based FHE schemes such as BGV, BFV, and CKKS are widely recognized as leading candidate in FHE area. Barrett Modular Multiplication (BMM) for polynomial multiplication is widely adopted in PQC and FHE hardware accelerators due to its hardware friendly nature and efficient modular reduction capabilities. However, Side-Channel Attacks (SCAs) and Hardware Trojans may introduce intentional faults, while aging and various other factors can cause unintentional faults. These faults may target the BM M unit, one of the most critical components of PQC and FHE infrastructures, potentially leading to information leakage and compromising system security. In this paper, we employ a Statistical Reduction Monitoring (SRM) method to protect the BM M unit against such adversarial conditions. The proposed approach incurs minimal hardware overhead while providing efficient detection of both random and bur

Problem

• Barrett Modular Multiplication
• Fault Detection
• Post-Quantum Cryptography
• Fully Homomorphic Encryption
• Hardware Security

Innovation

• Barrett Modular Multiplication
• Fault Detection
• Statistical Reduction Monitoring
• Post-Quantum Cryptography
• Hardware Security