curve25519-dalek-source/README.md

# curve25519-dalek [![](https://img.shields.io/crates/v/curve25519-dalek.svg)](https://crates.io/crates/curve25519-dalek) [![](https://img.shields.io/docsrs/curve25519-dalek)](https://docs.rs/curve25519-dalek) [![Rust](https://github.com/dalek-cryptography/curve25519-dalek/actions/workflows/rust.yml/badge.svg?branch=main)](https://github.com/dalek-cryptography/curve25519-dalek/actions/workflows/rust.yml)

<p align="center">
<img
 alt="dalek-cryptography logo: a dalek with edwards curves as sparkles coming out of its radar-schnozzley blaster thingies"
 width="200px"
 src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/dalek-cryptography/curve25519-dalek/docs/assets/dalek-logo-clear.png"/>
</p>

**A pure-Rust implementation of group operations on Ristretto and Curve25519.**

`curve25519-dalek` is a library providing group operations on the Edwards and
Montgomery forms of Curve25519, and on the prime-order Ristretto group.

`curve25519-dalek` is not intended to provide implementations of any particular
crypto protocol.  Rather, implementations of those protocols (such as
[`x25519-dalek`][x25519-dalek] and [`ed25519-dalek`][ed25519-dalek]) should use
`curve25519-dalek` as a library.

`curve25519-dalek` is intended to provide a clean and safe _mid-level_ API for use
implementing a wide range of ECC-based crypto protocols, such as key agreement,
signatures, anonymous credentials, rangeproofs, and zero-knowledge proof
systems.

In particular, `curve25519-dalek` implements Ristretto, which constructs a
prime-order group from a non-prime-order Edwards curve.  This provides the
speed and safety benefits of Edwards curve arithmetic, without the pitfalls of
cofactor-related abstraction mismatches.

# Use

To import `curve25519-dalek`, add the following to the dependencies section of
your project's `Cargo.toml`:
```toml
curve25519-dalek = "4"
```

## Feature Flags

| Feature        | Default? | Description |
| :---           |  :---:   | :---        |
| `alloc`        |    ✓     | Enables Edwards and Ristretto multiscalar multiplication, batch scalar inversion, and batch Ristretto double-and-compress. |
| `rand_core`    |          | Enables `Scalar::random` and `RistrettoPoint::random`. This is an optional dependency whose version is not subject to SemVer. See [below](#public-api-semver-exemptions) for more details. |
| `digest`       |          | Enables `RistrettoPoint::{from_hash, hash_from_bytes}` and `Scalar::{from_hash, hash_from_bytes}`. This is an optional dependency whose version is not subject to SemVer. See [below](#public-api-semver-exemptions) for more details. |
| `serde`        |          | Enables `serde` serialization/deserialization for all the point and scalar types. |
| `simd_backend` |          | See [backends](#backends). Requires nightly. |
| `fiat_backend` |          | See [backends](#backends). |

To disable the default features when using `curve25519-dalek` as a dependency,
add `default-features = false` to the dependency in your `Cargo.toml`. To
disable it when running `cargo`, add the `--no-default-features` CLI flag.

## Major Version API Changes

Breaking changes for each major version release can be found in
[`CHANGELOG.md`](CHANGELOG.md), under the "Breaking changes" subheader. The
latest breaking changes are below:

### Breaking changes in 4.0.0

* Update the MSRV from 1.41 to 1.56.1
* Update backend selection to be more automatic. See [backends](#backends)
* Remove `std` feature flag
* Remove `nightly` feature flag
* Deprecate `EdwardsPoint::hash_from_bytes` and rename it
  `EdwardsPoint::nonspec_map_to_curve`
* Require including a new trait, `use curve25519_dalek::traits::BasepointTable`
  whenever using `EdwardsBasepointTable` or `RistrettoBasepointTable`

This release also does a lot of dependency updates and relaxations to unblock upstream build issues.

# Backends

Curve arithmetic is implemented and used by selecting one of the following backend features:

| Feature            | Implementation                                             | Target backends             |
| :---               | :---                                                       | :---                        |
| serial - [default] | Serial formulas                                            | `u32` <br/> `u64`           |
| simd_backend       | [Parallel][parallel_doc], using Advanced Vector Extensions | `avx2` <br/> `avx512ifma`   |
| fiat_backend       | Formally verified field arithmetic from [fiat-crypto]      | `fiat_u32` <br/> `fiat_u64` |

## Target backends

Target backend selection via `serial` and `fiat_backend` features is automatic based on the build target.
E.g., building with the serial backend on a 64-bit machine the `u64` backend is automatically chosen.
And with the `fiat_backend` feature, the `fiat_u64` backend is automatically chosen.

If a 32-bit backend is needed on an x86-64 Linux machine then cross-compiling will work:

* `sudo apt install gcc-multilib` (or whatever package manager you use)
* `rustup target add i686-unknown-linux-gnu`
* `cargo build --target i686-unknown-linux-gnu`

## Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX)

Selection within `simd_backend` is manual by using `RUSTFLAGS` as below:

| Target feature | `RUSTFLAGS`  Environment variable value |
| :---           | :---                                    |
| avx2           | `-C target_feature=+avx2`               |
| avx512ifma     | `-C target_feature=+avx512ifma`         |

This also requires using nightly e.g. by `cargo +nightly build` to build.

# Documentation

The semver-stable, public-facing `curve25519-dalek` API is documented [here][docs].

## Building Docs Locally

The `curve25519-dalek` documentation requires a custom HTML header to include
KaTeX for math support. Unfortunately `cargo doc` does not currently support
this, but docs can be built using
```sh
make doc
```
for regular docs, and
```sh
make doc-internal
```
for docs that include private items.

# Maintenance Policies

All on-by-default features of this library are covered by
[semantic versioning][semver] (SemVer). SemVer exemptions are outlined below
for MSRV and public API.

## Minimum Supported Rust Version

| Releases | MSRV   |
| :---     | :---   |
| 4.x      | 1.56.1 |
| 3.x      | 1.41.0 |

From 4.x and on, MSRV changes will be accompanied by a minor version bump.

## Public API SemVer Exemptions

Breaking changes to SemVer exempted components affecting the public API will be accompanied by
_some_ version bump. Below are the specific policies:

| Releases | Public API Component(s)               | Policy              |
| :---     | :---                                  | :---                |
| 4.x      | Dependencies `digest` and `rand_core` | Minor SemVer bump   |

# Safety

The `curve25519-dalek` types are designed to make illegal states
unrepresentable.  For example, any instance of an `EdwardsPoint` is
guaranteed to hold a point on the Edwards curve, and any instance of a
`RistrettoPoint` is guaranteed to hold a valid point in the Ristretto
group.

All operations are implemented using constant-time logic (no
secret-dependent branches, no secret-dependent memory accesses),
unless specifically marked as being variable-time code.
We believe that our constant-time logic is lowered to constant-time
assembly, at least on `x86_64` targets.

As an additional guard against possible future compiler optimizations,
the `subtle` crate places an optimization barrier before every
conditional move or assignment.  More details can be found in [the
documentation for the `subtle` crate][subtle_doc].

Some functionality (e.g., multiscalar multiplication or batch
inversion) requires heap allocation for temporary buffers.  All
heap-allocated buffers of potentially secret data are explicitly
zeroed before release.

However, we do not attempt to zero stack data, for two reasons.
First, it's not possible to do so correctly: we don't have control
over stack allocations, so there's no way to know how much data to
wipe.  Second, because `curve25519-dalek` provides a mid-level API,
the correct place to start zeroing stack data is likely not at the
entrypoints of `curve25519-dalek` functions, but at the entrypoints of
functions in other crates.

The implementation is memory-safe, and contains no significant
`unsafe` code.  The SIMD backend uses `unsafe` internally to call SIMD
intrinsics.  These are marked `unsafe` only because invoking them on an
inappropriate CPU would cause `SIGILL`, but the entire backend is only
compiled with appropriate `target_feature`s, so this cannot occur.

# Performance

Benchmarks are run using [`criterion.rs`][criterion]:

```sh
cargo bench --features "alloc"
# Uses avx2 or ifma only if compiled for an appropriate target.
export RUSTFLAGS="-C target_cpu=native"
cargo +nightly bench --features "alloc simd_backend"
```

Performance is a secondary goal behind correctness, safety, and
clarity, but we aim to be competitive with other implementations.

# FFI

Unfortunately, we have no plans to add FFI to `curve25519-dalek` directly.  The
reason is that we use Rust features to provide an API that maintains safety
invariants, which are not possible to maintain across an FFI boundary.  For
instance, as described in the _Safety_ section above, invalid points are
impossible to construct, and this would not be the case if we exposed point
operations over FFI.

However, `curve25519-dalek` is designed as a *mid-level* API, aimed at
implementing other, higher-level primitives.  Instead of providing FFI at the
mid-level, our suggestion is to implement the higher-level primitive (a
signature, PAKE, ZKP, etc) in Rust, using `curve25519-dalek` as a dependency,
and have that crate provide a minimal, byte-buffer-oriented FFI specific to
that primitive.

# Contributing

Please see [CONTRIBUTING.md][contributing].

Patches and pull requests should be make against the `develop`
branch, **not** `main`.

# About

**SPOILER ALERT:** *The Twelfth Doctor's first encounter with the Daleks is in
his second full episode, "Into the Dalek". A beleaguered ship of the "Combined
Galactic Resistance" has discovered a broken Dalek that has turned "good",
desiring to kill all other Daleks. The Doctor, Clara and a team of soldiers
are miniaturized and enter the Dalek, which the Doctor names Rusty. They
repair the damage, but accidentally restore it to its original nature, causing
it to go on the rampage and alert the Dalek fleet to the whereabouts of the
rebel ship. However, the Doctor manages to return Rusty to its previous state
by linking his mind with the Dalek's: Rusty shares the Doctor's view of the
universe's beauty, but also his deep hatred of the Daleks. Rusty destroys the
other Daleks and departs the ship, determined to track down and bring an end
to the Dalek race.*

`curve25519-dalek` is authored by Isis Agora Lovecruft and Henry de Valence. 

Portions of this library were originally a port of [Adam Langley's
Golang ed25519 library](https://github.com/agl/ed25519), which was in
turn a port of the reference `ref10` implementation.  Most of this code,
including the 32-bit field arithmetic, has since been rewritten.

The fast `u32` and `u64` scalar arithmetic was implemented by Andrew Moon, and
the addition chain for scalar inversion was provided by Brian Smith.  The
optimised batch inversion was contributed by Sean Bowe and Daira Hopwood.

The `no_std` and `zeroize` support was contributed by Tony Arcieri.

The formally verified `fiat_backend` integrates Rust code generated by the
[Fiat Crypto project](https://github.com/mit-plv/fiat-crypto) and was
contributed by François Garillot.

Thanks also to Ashley Hauck, Lucas Salibian, Manish Goregaokar, Jack Grigg,
Pratyush Mishra, Michael Rosenberg, @pinkforest, and countless others for their
contributions.

[ed25519-dalek]: https://github.com/dalek-cryptography/ed25519-dalek
[x25519-dalek]: https://github.com/dalek-cryptography/x25519-dalek
[docs]: https://docs.rs/curve25519-dalek/
[contributing]: https://github.com/dalek-cryptography/curve25519-dalek/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md
[criterion]: https://github.com/japaric/criterion.rs
[parallel_doc]: https://docs.rs/curve25519-dalek/latest/curve25519_dalek/backend/vector/index.html
[subtle_doc]: https://docs.rs/subtle
[fiat-crypto]: https://github.com/mit-plv/fiat-crypto
[semver]: https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0.html
[rngcorestd]: https://github.com/rust-random/rand/tree/7aa25d577e2df84a5156f824077bb7f6bdf28d97/rand_core#crate-features