Java implementation and performance evaluation of some

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ISSN 2224-5758 (Paper) ISSN 2224-896X (Online)
Vol.3, No.4, 2013
45
Java Implementation and Performance Evaluation of Some
Cryptographic Ciphers under WinXP and Linux Operating System
Platforms
Najib A. kofahi
Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Sciences
Yarmouk University - Irbid, Jordan, E-mail: nkofahi@yu.edu.jo
Abstract
In this article we present a performance comparison of four symmetric block ciphers namely DES, Triple-DES, AES,
and Blowfish. Performance evaluation based on CPU execution time is conducted under WinXP and Ubuntu /Linux
version 8.10 operating system platforms. The study is conducted using Java programming language, Java
Cryptography Architecture (JCA) and Java Cryptography Extension (JCE). The evaluation of the performance of
these algorithms is done for encryption, decryption and key generation operations.
Keywords: DES, Triple-DES, AES, Blowfish, Performance Evaluation, Cryptography, JCA & JCE, Operating
Systems.
1. Introduction
Conducting commercial transactions (i.e., e-commerce) over the Internet has witnessed an important development
and is widely spread these days. Among the factors that causes this includes developments in technology, networks
and data security. This growth in e-commerce use lays an important role in the global development of economy and
can be a key driver of increasing sales while using fewer production resources. The need to protect and secure
e-commerce and other electronic transactions has placed a great demand on a strong and efficient internet security
system.
These days, developments in security over the Internet is the key to confidence for conducting Internet services and
for people wanting to protect their sensitive information, or doing business and all kinds of communications over the
Internet.
Many encryption/decryption algorithms were developed and employed for this purpose with varying properties and
advantages/disadvantages of each. The two general types of key-based encryption/decryption algorithms are
symmetric (also called conventional) algorithms (Douglas 2005), (William Stallings 2009), (Eashwar and Madhuri
2003) and asymmetric (or public-key) algorithms (Douglas 2005), (William Stallings 2009), (Kofahi, 2006), (CGI
Group 2013), (Jawahar and Nagesh 2011).
In the first approach, i.e., symmetric algorithms (En Wikipedia Cryptography 2013), the same (secret) key generated
is used for both encryption and decryption operations. The two families of symmetric algorithms are block ciphers
and stream ciphers. Data Encryption Standard (DES), Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), Triple-DES and
Blowfish are considered the most popular symmetric block ciphers.
Asymmetric algorithms use public key for encryption and private key for decryption (Omar et al. 2012). Most
popular asymmetric ciphers are RSA, Diffie-Hellman, and ECC.
In this work the implementation of four symmetric algorithms namely DES, Triple-DES, AES and Blowfish using
Java Cryptography Architecture (JCA) and Java Cryptography Extension (JCE) is carried out. Performance
evaluation based on their execution time will be presented under WinXP and Linux platforms.
Section 2 gives a brief description of the algorithms to be compared. The methodology and an overview of JCA and

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the Java implementation of the ciphers under consideration are discussed in Section 3. Section 4 introduces the
testing methodology and presents the results obtained from the implementation. Finally, Section 5 gives the
conclusion of the study and points to the future work.
2. The Ciphers under consideration
Performance evaluation based on execution time of some encryption/decryption algorithms was reported (Kofahi
2006), (Jawahar and Nagesh 2011), (En Wikipedia Data_Encryption_Standard 2013), (Elminaam et al. 2010). In
this paper we attempt to impleme, nt four algorithms in Java then compare their performance evaluation based on
their execution time under WinXP and Linux platforms. In the next subsections a brief description of how each of
these algorithms works is presented.
2.1. DES Algorithm
The Data Encryption Standard (DES) (Eashwar and Madhuri 2003), (Singh and Maini 2011), is a block ciphers
which have been designated as cryptography standard by the US government. The DES has a pronounced effect on
the development of modern cryptography in the academic society. DES (especially its still-approved and much more
secure Triple-DES variant) remains quite popular; it is used across a wide range of applications, from ATM
encryption to e-mail privacy and secure remote access. Many other block ciphers have been designed and released,
with considerable variation in quality.
In DES, 16-cycle Feistel system is used for encryption, with overall 56-bits key bit key permuted into 16 48-bits sub
keys, one for each cycle. For decryption, an identical algorithm is used, but the order of sub keys is reversed. The left
(L) and right (R) blocks are 32-bits each yielding 64-bits bloc size. The hash function specified by the standard using
the "S-boxes", which takes 32-bits data block and one of the 48-bits sub keys as input and produce 32-bits output. In
the block diagram the 64-bits key is used, but 8-bits are used only for parity.
Figure 1. DES encryption process block diagram (Douglas 2005)
2.2. Triple-DES algorithm
T-DES (En Wikipedia Triple_DES 2013), (Hamdan et al. 2010), is a modified version of the DES algorithm that

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improves the security strength of the DES by applying the algorithm three times in succession with three different
keys each of 56-bits. T-DES thus simply extends the key size of DES by applying the algorithm three times as
shown in Figure 2 below.
Figure 2. T-DES block diagram
In the T-DES algorithm, the combined key size is thus 168 bits (3 times 56), which is beyond the reach of brute-force
techniques. TDES was the answer to the security flaws of the DES without the need to designing a whole new
cryptosystem.
2.3. AES algorithm
NIST, The National Institute of Standards and Technology issued a call in 1997 for proposals for an encryption
standard as a new official standard. The new standard is called the advanced encryption standard (AES). NIST
required that AES should have security strength equal to or better than the TDES and significantly improved
efficiency (Guido Bertoni1 et al. 2002).
NIST required that AES should have security strength equal to or better than the TDES and significantly improved
efficiency (Hamdan et al. 2010), (En Wikipedia Advanced_Encryption_Standard 2013). AES consists of four
invertible different stages that make up a standard round (William Stallings 2009). The stages are iterated 10 times
for 128-bit key, 12 times for 192-bit key, and 14 times for 256-bit key. The four stages that consists the standard
round are:
• Substitute bytes: nonlinear procedure that uses the S-box to perform byte by byte of the data block.
• Shift rows: a simple transformation that uses permutation that shifts the bytes within the data block in
cyclic fashion.
• Mix columns: a simple transformation that uses arithmetic over
8
(2 )GF to group 4-bytes together forming
4-term polynomial then multiplies the polynomials with a fixed polynomial mod
4
( 1)x + .
• Add round key: bitwise XOR of the current block with a portion of the expanded key.
The block that depicts the encryption/decryption process stages is shown in Figure 3.

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Figure 3. Block diagram of main steps of AES (Eashwar and Madhuri 2003)
2.4. Blowfish algorithm
Blowfish uses 64-bits block size, and a variable key size ranges from 32-bits to 448-bits. Blowfish algorithm consists
two parts: key expansion part and data encryption part. Key expansion converts the key into several sub key sub key
arrays of total 4168 bytes. Data encryption part is done via 16 round Feistel network. Each round consists of the key
permutation, and the key- and data- dependent substitution.
All operations are XORs and addition on 32-bits words. The details descriptions can be found in (Douglas 2005),
(Anand and Karthikeyan 2012). Figure 4 shows the block diagram.

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Figure 4: block diagram of blowfish (Douglas 2005)
3. Methodology and Java Cryptography Architecture
This section briefly introduces the implementation diagrams and the Java (JCA, JCE) tools used to implement the
above mentioned algorithms under WinXP and Linux. The algorithms are implemented and tested in the same
environment. The execution time is measured for the three phases: key generation, encryption process, and
decryption.
3.1 Encryption/Decryption Processes
The following steps are used to generate the key pair for ECC:
• Initialize the required pair of keys and their sizes and specify the algorithm and provider that support them.
• Specify the suitable curve by specifying the parameters of elliptic curve.
• Generate pair of Keys.
• Determine public and private keys.
The block diagram of the encryption phase for the algorithms under consideration is shown in Figures 5.

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The block diagram of the decryption phase for the algorithms under consideration is shown in Figures 6.
3.2. Java and Java Cryptography Architecture
Java, Java Cryptography Architecture (JCA), and Java Cryptography Extension (JCE) were used as
implementation tools. JCA is designed to allow developers to incorporate both low-level and high-level security
functionality into their programs (En Wikipedia Java_cryptography 2013), (Marco et al. 1999), (Jamie et al.
2000), (Java Sun j2se 2013), (Java Sun 2013), (Marco Pistoia et al. 2013). It includes the parts of the Java 2
SDK Security API related to cryptography, as well as a set of conventions and specifications. It also includes a
"provider" architecture that allows for multiple and interoperable cryptography implementations.
Two Java APIs JCA and JCE both part of J2SE SDK v1.6 (Larry et al. 2001), (Flanagan 1999), define the
general architecture and specific services for cryptographic operations. J2SE v1.6 comes with nine bundled
providers: “SUN1.6”, “SunJSSE1.6”, “SunRsaSign1.5”, “SunJCE1.6”, "SunSASL1.5", "XMLDSig1.0",
Figure 5. Block diagram of encryption stage (Kofahi 2006)
Figure 6. Block diagram of decryption stage (Kofahi 2006)

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"SunPCSC1.6", "SunMSCAPI1.6" and “SunJGSS1.0”. Other third party providers like “BC1.6” (Bouncycastle
2013), “Flexi1.6” (CDC Informatic 2013) were also used in the implementation.
3.3. Packages and Classes used in implementation
The following packages and classes are used in the program:
java.io.*; // to initialize files using (File, FileInputStream, FileOutputStram) classes.
java.security. KeyPairGenerator; // to initialize pair of Keys and which algorithm and provider //support theses
key and to initialize the size of the key .
java.security.KeyPair; // to generate pair of Keys.
// to determine the public and the private keys.
java.security.PrivateKey;
java.security.PublicKey;
java.security.SecureRandom; // this class are used when the pair of keys are
//generated to choose parameter randomly.
java.security.Security; //to add the two items of this provider and to //use there code
in program.
javax.crypto.Cipher; //to initialize cipher for the algorithm and specify the mode
which we want ENCRYPT-MODE or DECRYPT-MODE
javax.crypto.CipherInputStream; // to decrypt the file.
javax.crypto.CipherOutputStream; // to encrypt the file.
4. Experimental setup
We give here the experimental set up, and graphically present the execution time of each algorithm for the sake of
performance evaluation. We experiment with different plaintext file sizes and different file contents WinXp and
Linux platforms.
4.1 Experiment
The four algorithms were run on two different tests; the first test executed under windows XP professional version
2002 service pack 2 on Intel®, Pentium® with Dual-Core CPU speed of 1.60 GHz and a total of 1GB of RAM.
The second test was conducted in the same environment and was executed under Ubuntu /Linux version 8.10
released in October 2008. The four ciphers are performed on the same files of sizes (100KB, 1MB and 10 MB). The
algorithms were tested using key sizes shown in Table 1.
Table 1. Algorithms key sizes
Algorithm name Key size
DES 56
T-DES 112
AES 128
Blowfish 56

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The experiment was repeated 100 times for each algorithm and for key generation, the encryption operation and the
decryption operation.
The average of the 100 runs for each operation was computed for each algorithm.
4.2. Results
In the experiment, the CPU execution time is computed for the four algorithms under WinXP and linux. CPU time
includes: system (kernel) time and user time. The system time is the execution time in kernel mode, and the user time
is execution time in user mode.
4.2.1. First Test Results
The CPU execution time in seconds for the four algorithms under WinXP with file size of 100 KB is shown in Figure
7.
The CPU execution time in seconds for the four algorithms under WinXP with file size of 1MB is shown in Figure 8.
Also, the CPU execution time in seconds for the four algorithms under WinXP with file size of 10MB is shown in
Figure 9.
Figure 8. CPU execution time in seconds (WinXP, 1MB)
Figure 7. CPU execution time in seconds (WinXP, 100KB)

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4.2.2. Second Test Results
The CPU execution time in seconds, for the four algorithms under Linux with file size of 100KB, is shown in Figure
10.
The CPU execution time in seconds, for the four algorithms under Linux with file size of 1MB, is shown in Figure
11.
Figure 9. CPU execution time in seconds (WinXP, 10MB)
Figure 11. CPU execution time in seconds (Linux, 1MB)
Figure 10. CPU execution time in seconds (Linux, 100KB)

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The CPU execution time in seconds, for the four algorithms under Linux with file size of 10MB, is shown in Figure
12.
From the first test results for WinXP (Figures 7, 8, and 9), it is clear that the Blowfish algorithm is the fastest
followed by AES then DES and then the TDES algorithm. It is obviously clear that because of the increased
complexity incorporated within the TDES, which is needed to address the security issues that exist in the DES
algorithm, is degrading the performance in terms of the CPU time. Also, it is clear from Figures above that the
blowfish algorithm outperforms the other algorithms in all tests. Also, the key generation time is almost negligible
compared to encryption/decryption time. From Figures for Linux, it is clear that the execution time is shorter for all
algorithms than that for WinXP.
5. Conclusions and Future work
In this research we presented performance evaluation using Java implementation of four symmetric block ciphers:
DES, Triple-DES, AES, and Blowfish.
Java programming language, JCA and JCE were used as an implementation tools. Performance evaluation based on
their CPU execution time is presented under WinXP and Linux operating system platforms.
From the experimental results shown in figures one can derive the following:
• Blowfish algorithm is the fastest among the four algorithms for both encryption and decryption and
outperform the other three algorithms in all tests and under WinXP and Linux.
• The key generation time in all algorithms is almost negligible compared to encryption/decryption time.
• The CPU execution time under Linux platform is shorter for the four algorithms than that under WinXP.
• Triple-DES algorithm is the best in terms of strength, but its encryption/decryption times are the longest
among all algorithms for all cases.
In future, we would like to experiment with these and new asymmetric algorithms under different parameters and
setups for better characterization and performance evaluation.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to express my gratitude to Yarmouk University, Irbid-Jordan for supporting the publication of this
research work. This research was completed while I was on sabbatical leave from Yarmouk University. Also, I
would like to express my gratitude to the Hashemite University – Jordan, where I spent my sabbatical leave.
Figure 12. CPU execution time in seconds (Linux, 10MB)

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Najib A. Kofahi is a professor of computer science at Yarmouk University (YU). He received his Ph.D. in
computer science from the University of Missouri-Rolla (USA) in 1987. He was granted scholarship for
MSc. and Ph.D. from YU in 1981. Currently he is on sabbatical leave from Yarmouk University and he is
a faculty member in the department of computer sciences at YU – Jordan since 1987.
During his stay at YU he was the dean of the Faculty of Information Technology and Computer Sciences.
He also worked as the chairman of the computer science department during the years 1990-1992. During
his stay at yarmouk he worked on the computer science curriculum development since his appointment.
Also, he worked extensively in the curriculum development at Philadelphia University-Jordan in the
academic year 1993-1994 during which he worked as the chairman of science department, while on
sabbatical leave from YU. In September 2000 he went on leave from YU for four years during which he
worked as a visiting associate professor at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (FUPM).
While at KFUPM, he led an online course development team to develop online course material for
algorithms course. He has several journal and conference research publications in a number of research
areas. His research interest focuses on E-Learning, operating systems, distributed systems, performance
evaluation and computer and data security.

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