Sony develops “CLEFIA” anti-piracy algorithm

Sony Corporation has just  announced CLEFIA (based on the French word “clef” or key). CLEFIA is “a new highly secure and efficient block cipher algorithm that delivers advanced copyright protection and authentication” for digital data like music and images. Sony said that CLEFIA “maintains high security levels while providing both world-leading hardware and software implementation capabilities, the combination of which had proved difficult until now.”

Sony will reveal more about CLEFIA at the Fast Software Encryption 2007 international conference in Luxembourg (the conference starts on March 26 and will run for three days). Here are other details:

• When implemented in hardware it achieves maximum throughput of 1.42 Gbps using a 0.09 micrometer CMOS standard cell library and gate size of just 6.1K.
• Able to provide advanced capabilities, even in restrictive environments such as smart cards and mobile devices.
• When implemented in software it can realize high speed performance on a wide variety of processors.
• CLEFIA is said to be more secure and faster than most other security measures – it takes fewer operations to encode and decode (that means the gadget’s hardware won’t be burdened; that means it is possible for CLEFIA to be used by many AV devices).
• CLEFIA is a strong cipher: block length is 128 bits, while key length can be selected from 128 bits, 192 bits, and 256 bits.

Apparently, Sony’s aim is to establish an environment in which CLEFIA can be used across various applications and products such as AV devices “while continuing to develop technologies that our customers can use with confidence.”

For those of us who still remember the Sony BMG rootkit scheme from 2005 (which became a costly “scandal” in 2006), we’re wondering how soon Sony will implement CLEFIA in commercial applications like its wide range of video, music, and video game products. CLEFIA may just be the fast, non-intrusive, tough-to-crack, and convenient anti-piracy tool that today’s digital market has been watching out for.

Sony Corporation has just  announced CLEFIA (based on the French word “clef” or key). CLEFIA is “a new highly secure and efficient block cipher algorithm that delivers advanced copyright protection and authentication” for digital data like music and images. Sony said that CLEFIA “maintains high security levels while providing both world-leading hardware and software implementation capabilities, the combination of which had proved difficult until now.”

Sony will reveal more about CLEFIA at the Fast Software Encryption 2007 international conference in Luxembourg (the conference starts on March 26 and will run for three days). Here are other details:

• When implemented in hardware it achieves maximum throughput of 1.42 Gbps using a 0.09 micrometer CMOS standard cell library and gate size of just 6.1K.
• Able to provide advanced capabilities, even in restrictive environments such as smart cards and mobile devices.
• When implemented in software it can realize high speed performance on a wide variety of processors.
• CLEFIA is said to be more secure and faster than most other security measures – it takes fewer operations to encode and decode (that means the gadget’s hardware won’t be burdened; that means it is possible for CLEFIA to be used by many AV devices).
• CLEFIA is a strong cipher: block length is 128 bits, while key length can be selected from 128 bits, 192 bits, and 256 bits.

Apparently, Sony’s aim is to establish an environment in which CLEFIA can be used across various applications and products such as AV devices “while continuing to develop technologies that our customers can use with confidence.”

For those of us who still remember the Sony BMG rootkit scheme from 2005 (which became a costly “scandal” in 2006), we’re wondering how soon Sony will implement CLEFIA in commercial applications like its wide range of video, music, and video game products. CLEFIA may just be the fast, non-intrusive, tough-to-crack, and convenient anti-piracy tool that today’s digital market has been watching out for.